


Percy Weasley: Rogue Demon Hunter

by viola_dreamwalk



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2003-08-02
Updated: 2011-05-01
Packaged: 2017-10-17 08:17:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 68,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/174783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viola_dreamwalk/pseuds/viola_dreamwalk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the summer after OotP, and Percy Weasley is a man without a mission.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Percy Sings the Blues

**Author's Note:**

> This goes rather wildly AU after the close of 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.' Vaguely crossover-ish with Angel the Series. Good times.

  
Percy Weasley's world effectively ended on a nondescript Monday morning in June.

Needless to say, at the time, this rather upset him.

There were warning signs, of course, but no one -- certainly not Percy -- would have thought things would come to a head so quickly. The day started out normally enough: inbox, outbox, report, report, memo, tea trolley, a brief pause for Earl Grey and a lemon-currant scone, report, memo, memo.

Memo.

Percy had to read it twice. When he looked up he should have been less surprised, considering what he'd just read, to see two burly security wizards standing between his and Williams' desks.

"I'm afraid, ladies and gentlemen," said the taller of the two, "that you're all going to have to come with us.

"Has there been a bomb threat?" Williams, a slim, Muggleborn brunette who'd taken a first at Oxford in political science and routinely won the _Ministry's Most Shag-able_ poll in _Wizard's Quarterly_ , asked hopefully.

"You wish. Get up or we'll have to get rough with you." The security wizard sounded just a shade too excited about that for Percy's taste.

"See here-" Percy began, standing up.

"You're out, Weasley, the whole lot of you. Fudge resigned five minutes ago, so hit the bricks -- and good riddance, if you ask me."

"Nobody did ask you!" Williams was on her feet now as well.

"Look," said the second security wizard. "We're just doing our job. We're very sorry it has to be this way, but everyone on Fudge's personal staff is required to have a security escort from the building effective immediately." He shrugged. "It's standard procedure."

He attempted to smile winningly at Williams, who made a disgusted noise in the back of her throat, wrenched open a desk drawer and began throwing personal effects into her designer messenger bag.

The world began to swim sickeningly and Percy's knees felt suddenly weak. He sat down heavily in his chair.

Fifteen minutes later, all twenty members of Fudge's personal staff were standing on a London street corner, clutching bags, boxes, potted plants and, in more than a few cases, several hundred Galleons worth of purloined office equipment.

Twenty minutes later, they were joined by at least a dozen undersecretaries, department heads and other Fudge appointees who had, apparently, been very loyal, very stupid or simply not fast enough to switch sides before the ax dropped.

"What happened?" asked a junior typist, who was clutching a potted ficus tree to her bosom and looked on the verge of tears.

"Harry fucking Potter happened," said the head of the Ludicrous Patents Office, shaking open his copy of _The Daily Prophet_. "What else is new?"

This news was greeted with a round of heartfelt swearing.

"Well," said Williams at last, "I don't know about you lot, but I'm going to find the nearest bar and get too drunk to see."

*

 _The Welsh Green_ was famous for this sort of thing. The bar had begun life as a dive and, one hundred and fifty years later, it was still a dive. The only difference now was that it was a very popular one. The place struggled for nearly fifty years, barely breaking even through The Great Exhibition, Darwin, Dickens, Gilbert and Sullivan and the Queen's Jubilee. By 1914, on the other hand, business was booming. _The Welsh Green_ , it seemed, thrived on misery, and the Twentieth Century had that and some to spare. Wars, scandals, stock market crashes, the Chudley Cannons 1986 season, all brought despondent patrons to the bar. It was like the Titanic of drowned sorrows.

"Not enough lifeboats."

"Wha-?"

Percy turned unsteadily to look across the table at Jenkins, the former (as of this morning) Undersecretary of... well, something-or-other. It hardly mattered now.

"Lifeboats," Percy said again. "There weren't enough of them. On the _Titanic_."

"Oh, well then. Is that all?"

"We're all going to drown!" Percy said, downing the last of his drink. He thought it was probably whiskey, but at this point couldn't be sure. His taste buds were no longer on speaking terms with his brain.

"That's politics, Weasley," Williams said, shaking her head and tossing back another shot of some overpriced Bulgarian vodka with an unpronounceable name.

"That's bloody easy for you to say! Do you know what this opportunity cost me?"

"We've all got a sad story, Weasley," she said. "Have another drink."

He did. Vodka this time, and it woke his taste buds up rather rudely.

"Good Lord, Williams," he choked. "How do you drink this stuff?"

"I'm plowed," she responded. "Wasted, wrecked, pissed, three sheets to the wind." She toasted him with her glass. "You're cute… in a bumbling, middle-child sort of way. Pity we're so drunk."

At which point, Williams fell off her chair.

Percy, rather gallantly if he did say so himself, paid her tab and got her settled into a cab and on her way safely home before any permanent damage was done. Something he hoped she might be grateful to him for once she sobered up.

Percy was, in spite of everything else, a generally decent sort underneath it all. He simply had some unresolved family issues, and who didn't?

He stumbled back to his chair, snagging what was left of Williams' fifth of vodka and pouring it clumsily into his glass. Jenkins was snoring loudly, his head on the table. Percy was beginning to feel a bit woozy himself, come to think of it, but he finished the vodka anyway.

At a corner booth, the chair of the Muggle-Worthy Excuse Committee was singing a rather off-color song accompanied by two speech writers, a bottle of Ogden's and a mail clerk who'd had the misfortune to be Fudge's second cousin's godson.

"Percy?"

He looked up. There wasn't anybody there.

"Over here." A pause. "No, _here_. To your right, you dimwit."

Percy turned to the right and realized that, somewhere along the way, his glasses must have gone, because he couldn't see. He reached up to touch his face and missed.

"Percy?" whoever was standing there said again. They were blurred beyond all recognition, and Percy had the sudden sensation that he might be violently sick if he didn't get some fresh air.

The blur was sort of gold-ish around the middle and cherry red toward the top. It appeared, unlikely though this was, to have a halo of some sort. It glowed slightly around the edges. It was entirely possible that it had wings. Percy began to feel a bit nervous. If this was an angel, he was in very deep trouble indeed, because it also seemed to be rather angry with him.

"You suck, Percy."

"I beg your pardon?"

"You suck," the blur said again. "Like a Hoover."

"I-" Percy began. "I need another drink."

"Wow. You really are pathetic."

"Well," Percy said, hefting his glass with no little difficulty, "I don't suppose you'll get any argument there."

And that was when Percy passed out.

*

There were voices coming from the kitchen when Percy woke up. It took him a very long moment to distinguish them from the pounding in his head and the ringing in his ears, but they were most definitely voices.

"What I don't understand is why you didn't call your mother," the first voice said, over the obscenely loud noise of a carton of milk being opened, "or at least one of your brothers."

"Maybe because I wanted to get him home in one piece?" a second voice replied. "Though in the cold light of day, I'm beginning to wonder why I bothered."

"Because he's your brother and you love him?"

There was an extended pause and then a very undignified snort. "Oh, sure. That must be it."

Gingerly, Percy sat up. He was still in his Ministry robes, but the side of his face felt oddly numb. He stumbled toward a small, square mirror on the far wall, just barely keeping himself upright.

"Oh, dear," said the mirror. "That isn't going to come off, if you ask me."

The room tilted threateningly and it was almost a full minute before things stayed still long enough for Percy to actually look at his own reflection. When he finally did, he ran a hand over his left cheek and blinked. At some point during the evening someone had apparently written _I am a massive wanker_ across his face. In permanent ink.

"Holy hell, woman," one of the someones said from the kitchen, followed by the sound of a cup being flung hurriedly into the sink, "is that meant to be coffee?"

"What else would it be?" This voice was definitely familiar, and female.

"I don't know, considering it very nearly _ate a hole through my tongue_."

"Stop being such a big baby." A pause. "If you don't like it, Kingsley, next time make it yourself."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Steeling himself, Percy made his way out of the bedroom and toward the kitchen. He was in no mood to deal with whoever was out there, but he also knew that if he didn't have a very large glass of water in very short order, he was very probably going to die.

His sister, Ginny, was sitting on the counter eating ginger-lemon biscuits directly from the box.

"Good morning, Percy," she said cheerfully, drumming her bare feet against a cabinet door. "You look awful."

"Oh, thank you ever so much," he groaned, just barely making it to a chair before his knees gave out.

"Headache?"

"Yes.” He fixed her with a look. “Kindly stop eating all my biscuits; they were expensive."

She stood up and flung the box into the sink. "Fine. Next time I get an owl that you've been sacked and are in danger of slipping into an alcoholic coma, I'll just leave well enough alone, shall I?"

"I didn't ask for your help!" Percy snapped. "And who the hell are you?"

"Kingsley Shacklebolt." The only other person in the kitchen held out a hand, which Percy pointedly ignored. "Your sister asked me to help you get home last night. You weren't in much shape to make it by your-"

Percy narrowed his eyes. "Don't you work for the Ministry?"

Shacklebolt looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Yes, I do. But I'm also an old friend of your father's." He paused. "Though, I'll admit we don't exactly advertise that fact these days."

"Because of Fudge."

"Among other reasons."

Shacklebolt looked over at Ginny, who was now calmly spooning sugar into a cup of black coffee. She glanced up and Shacklebolt shook his head just fractionally. Percy had the distinct impression they weren't telling him everything.

Not that he cared, of course.

"I appreciate the assistance," he began as Ginny shoved the mug of coffee into his hands. "I appreciate the," he took a sip and grimaced, "coffee. But hadn't the two of you better be going?"

"That's a nice thank you, after we carried your drunk carcass home from the pub and babysat you all night to make sure you didn't choke on your own-"

"Ginny," Shacklebolt said, "it's all right. Your brother clearly feels better-" He looked Percy over. "At least a bit better now. We'd better leave him be. Besides, your mother is going to be wondering where we've got to."

"Fine," she said, picking up her sandals. "I'm supposed to go see Dean this afternoon anyway."

Percy's curiosity got the better of him. "Who's Dean?"

Ginny gave him a supremely disgusted look. "My _boyfriend_."

"Ah," Percy said, feeling a bit blindsided that his baby sister, who was standing in his kitchen with a strange wizard at least twice her age, also suddenly had a boyfriend. "Do our parents know that you've taken up running about with strange men?"

"Percy, I've known Dean for four years. You've known Dean for five. He hardly qualifies as a 'strange man' and, not that it's any of your business, but Mum and Dad think he's perfectly charming. Dad is quite keen to see a West Hamm match with Dean's father."

"Oh, Thomas. Artistic chap. Likes football. I do remember him."

"I'm not exactly a stranger either, Percy," Shacklebolt said. "If that's what you were worried about."

"I wasn't- I didn't mean that exactly. I just wondered why Ginny chose to call you last night instead of any of our-"

"Maybe because no one else would have come," Ginny said bluntly. "And, honestly, I'm beginning to remember why.

"I said I was grateful-" Percy began, but Ginny and Shacklebolt were already on their way out.

"You're a massive wanker, Percy," Ginny said, and slammed the door.

*

For the record, Percy spent the entirety of the following week in bed.

At first it was the hangover. It held on for a record-making three days and made Percy wish he were dead. Then, after surviving on nothing but antacids, lukewarm water and melba toast, his head began to clear, the reality of the situation came home to him and he _really_ wished he were dead.

Here he was: Percy Weasley, age 20. Less than a week ago he'd been the youngest Junior Assistant ever to a Minister of Magic. Now, granted, that Minister was also likely to go down in history as one of the least effective to ever hold the office, but that had never bothered Percy much. Everyone had to start somewhere. But now, a scant two years out of Hogwarts, he was unemployed, alone and on the verge of being very, very broke.

He thought about this as his alarm went off on the morning of the fourth day and decided that, really, he was much better off in bed.

For the rest of his life.

This plan was disrupted on Friday morning, however, by the unexpected arrival of a visitor. They banged on the door for a full five minutes, while Percy lay very still underneath the covers and tried not to breathe too loudly.

He'd just dared to raise his head slightly when the front door to his flat banged open and Ginny barged in, saying, "I know you're in there, Percy, so it's no use pretending you aren't."

She marched straight into the bedroom, put her hands on her hips and gave him a look that reminded him of his mother – on a very bad day.

"Get up, already! Enough with the brooding. It's getting really old." Ginny yanked the drapes wide, and Percy retaliated by flinging the bedclothes up over his head.

"Does Mum know you're here?" he asked through the quilts.

"Are you kidding?" Ginny sat on the edge of the bed and flung the covers back. "Now get up. I'll make coffee."

"No!" Percy said, sitting up quickly. "I mean, don't bother."

He reached over the side of the bed, searching for his slippers. "How did you get in here, anyway?"

"The door was unlocked. If you don't want coffee, how about some tea?" she asked, and walked out of the bedroom without waiting for an answer.

Not quite sure what else to do, Percy got up and followed her into the kitchen.

He sat down at the table, pulling on his dressing gown. He ran a hand across his face and realized that he hadn't shaved in at least three days.

"You look like hell," Ginny said, filling the kettle with water.

Percy ignored her. "Why are you doing this?"

"Generally, boiling water is considered the first step."

"You know what I mean. Why are you here? Why are you speaking to me?"

Ginny sighed heavily. "When I figure it out, I'll let you know."

Percy laid his head on the table and closed his eyes.

"Are you going to just sit around forever?" Ginny said, finally, as the kettle began to whistle.

"My plan included more laying than actual sitting, but, generally, yes," Percy replied, without bothering to look up.

"I can't _believe_ you. After everything you did – after everything you said – you're just going to give up at the first sign of a little trouble. Well, it's nice to see that you walked away from your entire family for a purpose."

"Why do you think I'm so angry?" Percy snapped, sitting up. "I gave up everything I'd ever known and look how I've ended up."

"This is angry?" Ginny said with a snort. "Lolling about in your pajamas and feeling sorry for yourself? Well, gee, remind me never to make you mad. Sca-ry."

"Oh, go to hell."

Ginny slapped a mug of tea down on the table in front of him, slopping it onto the tablecloth. "Well, that's a bit more like it, at least."

Percy groaned. "Why don't you just leave me alone? Did you come over here for the sole purpose of abusing me?"

"I came over here because-" Ginny stopped, casting around for the right words. She stamped her foot against the kitchen floor in frustration. "You make it really difficult, you know that, Percy!"

"So sorry to inconvenience you," Percy grumbled, picking up his cup of tea.

Ginny threw up her hands. "Oh, be a man, Percy," she said, and picked up her bag and left.

Percy let his mug drop to the table with a thump. He was really going to have to stop letting her get in the last word. But he stared at the door for a few minutes after she'd gone, then went into bathroom and got cleaned up.

*

Waggley, Nystram and Nystram was one of the most exclusive career placement services in wizarding London. Under normal circumstances Percy wouldn't have even been able to afford to walk in the front door. But Celia Williams was extremely well-connected and wrangled free consultations for a few of the (former) members of Fudge's staff, Percy included.

He walked through the frosted glass double doors and breathed a sigh of relief. The pavement outside was nearly buckled with the heat, but Waggley, Nystram and Nystram kept the temperature in their offices a cool, permanent sixty-five degrees. Percy walked up to the reception desk, across a wide marble foyer and between two wide, curving metal staircases. Behind the desk was a flat, upright glass fountain embossed with the company logo. The receptionist swiveled around in her thousand-galleon ergonomic chair to face him and politely bid him good day in public-school tones.

Business, apparently, was very, very good.

"Percy Weasley," he said. "I have a nine o'clock."

The receptionist settled him, after asking whether he would care for a mineral water or a cappuccino, in an elegantly appointed waiting room at the top of one of the main staircases. After a few minutes, he was ushered into a small, circular office by a tall, statuesque witch with electric blue hair piled elaborately atop her head.

"Have a seat." She pulled out an ultra-modern chrome chair for him. "Coffee?"

Percy shook his head.

"I'm Sascha and I'll be your career counselor today, Mr.-" She checked her clipboard. "Weasley. All right, let's get started."

He settled back, as comfortably as possible, in his chair.

"Let's see. Your previous position was with the Ministry of Magic?"

Percy nodded.

"Did you enjoy it?"

Percy hesitated. "Bits of it, certainly."

"Which bits exactly?"

"The responsibility, the decision-making. I'd always wanted to work in government, so it was quite exciting for me. I was also quite fond of my co-workers."

Sascha was scribbling on her clipboard. "And the bits you didn't like?"

"Well, there was the part where my first supervisor went mad, and then my father tried to sabotage my career -- but that's really more a personal issue, I suppose."

"Any hobbies?"

Percy looked up, surprised. "Hobbies?"

"Yes," she said. "You know, things you enjoy doing in your leisure time." There was an extended pause. When Percy still didn't answer, she prompted, "Things you do for pleasure."

"Have you ever worked in government?"

"No, Mr. Weasley, I haven't actually."

"Well, there's your problem. We generally don't have much time for things like 'leisure time' or 'pleasure'."

"Ah, I see," Sascha replied seriously, though Percy suspected she was working to hide a bit of a smile.

She held up a stack of cards. "Tell me the first thing that pops into your head when you see each of these." She began to flip quickly through them.

"A cauldron. A lion. The Queen Mum. A sunflower. And is that a blancmange?"

Sascha nodded and put the cards away, pausing briefly to make notes on her clipboard.

"Stand up, please. In the center of the room, if you please. That's right." She picked up her wand. "Now, sing a few bars of something for me."

"You can't be serious."

"Do you want a job or don't you? Now, sing."

Percy managed to get through two choruses of "[ _Ain't got no coffee that's perking, Ain't got no winnings to lose, Ain't got a dream that is working, I ain't got nothing but the blues_](http://www.bing.com/music/songs/search?q=Ella+Fitzgerald+I+Ain't+Got+Nothin'+But+The+Blues&selected=89490F00-0100-11DB-89CA-0019B92A3933&FORM=DTPMUA)" before wavering to a halt and looking up expectantly.

"Not bad," she said, thoughtfully. "Go ahead and sit back down, this will only take a minute."

Sascha spent a few minutes doing something obscure with her wand and an enchanted quill before coming up with a rather unimpressive scrap of parchment. Percy began to feel relieved that he hadn't had to pay for the privilege.

After another minute, she handed the parchment over. It was embossed cardstock with a corporate watermark and probably cost more than Percy had made the previous year.

"We here at Waggley, Nystram and Nystram pride ourselves on providing the most comprehensive career aptitude testing and counseling the wizarding world has to offer," Sascha recited crisply. "If you need any help understanding your test results or wish to try our career placement service for a free thirty days, please make an appointment with the receptionist."

He turned to go.

"And, Mr. Weasley?"

He stopped and faced her again.

"Things aren't always what they appear to be. I wouldn't discount any of those options if I were you." She smiled and closed the door behind him.

Once outside, he looked down at the card. It read:

 _Career Analysis: Weasley, Percy_

 _1\. Wand Salesman  
2\. Lounge Singer  
3\. Personal Administrative Assistant  
4\. Chartered Accountancy  
5\. Champion for the Good of Humanity_

*

Things began to look up after that. Not so much because Percy had a job or a future or the love of his family, but simply because Celia Williams turned up and asked him whether or not he liked curry.

"Because," she said, "I know this fabulous little Indian place. They make the world's best vegetable curry."

So, while it wasn't exactly a career or a purpose in life, dinner with the six-time winner of _WQ_ 's _Ministry's Most Shag-able_ was still a great improvement over the rest of Percy's life.

"Thank you, by the way," she said over the naan bread, "for making sure I got home safely last Monday. I wasn't really in any shape to take care of myself."

"None of us were."

"Well, I appreciate it."

They were at a low table in a tiny, crowded Indian restaurant. The waiter arrived with steaming dishes of lamb vindaloo, chicken makhani, a platter of pakora and a variety of curries.

"Do you really think we can eat all of this?" Percy asked, surveying the food skeptically.

"Haven't you ever heard of leftovers?" Williams asked with a smile. "I don't cook. Without leftovers and take-away, I'd starve to death."

Percy shook his head. "My mother always did all the cooking. When I moved out, I couldn't even successfully boil water by myself. I had to learn." He paused. "Of course, if I don't find a new situation soon, I won't even have a pot to boil anything in."

"Tell me about it," Williams frowned, a wrinkle creasing her forehead. "I seem to be all out of luck in that regard."

"You're having trouble finding a position?" Percy asked, somewhat taken aback. "But you were the Ministry's shining star. I'd have thought people would be queuing up to hire you."

"Emphasis on the 'were' apparently," she said wryly. "The progressives -- Albus Dumbledore and his ilk -- hate me because I've been tainted by association with Fudge, and the conservatives don't want me because I'm Muggleborn, _and_ I went to Oxford -- which is, as far as most of them are concerned, one step away from running off to join a vegetarian nudist cult."

"Why did you go? Not, of course, that there's anything wrong with it," he added quickly.

"I went because I'd always wanted to. When I was a little girl I decided I was going to go to Oxford when I was old enough, and nothing was going to stop me. That included the very unexpected revelation that magic was real and I was a witch. I simply never felt the need to change my plans."

The waiter brought them another bottle of wine, and she smiled encouragingly at Percy.

"What about you, Weasley? Any hopes and dreams?"

"When I was sixteen I wanted to be England's youngest-ever Minister of Magic. You can see how well that turned out." He took a long drink.

"Oh, yes." She nodded knowingly. "I think every bright young thing who starts out in politics has that dream at some point. The reality is slightly less glamorous."

"Pity I had to learn that lesson the hard way."

"Everyone does. Though, to be fair, I suppose your disillusionment was particularly brutal. Bloody Fudge. I should have seen it coming, I suppose."

Percy sighed. "I suspected it might happen. What surprised me was that it happened so soon."

She shook her head. "The widespread fear that an attack by the evilest and most feared wizard of all time is imminent does funny things to the normal rules of the game." She paused. "What do you think, incidentally? Do you think it's true, or has it been blown all out of proportion by the papers?"

"Truthfully, I don't know," Percy said. "I know Harry Potter. He's a friend of my brother's. I always liked him, but he's... rash. He has a tendency to be stubborn, especially when it comes to believing in things, or people. If Dumbledore were to lead him in a particular direction I think he'd follow, without question – and my brother would follow Harry. That concerns me."

Williams nodded, watching him thoughtfully.

After dinner, Percy walked her back to her flat, even though she insisted it was too far out of his way.

At the door, she said, "Would you like to come in?"

"Maybe next time," he replied, with a smile. "I had a very nice time tonight. You were right about the curry -- it was excellent."

She put her key in the lock, then turned and kissed him briefly on the cheek. "Thanks, Weasley. You're a decent guy. Those are pretty rare, you know."

"Good night, Williams," he said, and made sure she was safely inside before strolling down the block.

It was getting late, the streetlamps giving off fuzzy globes of light and managing to make the shadows even darker than they would have been otherwise. The night breeze was warm, though, so Percy didn't hurry. He could have Apparated, but the walk home sounded appealing. The streets were empty and quiet, the night peaceful and calm. Percy actually found himself whistling as he walked. He grinned a bit and shoved his hands into his pockets.

"Aren't you delicious?" a low voice said suddenly from the darkness.

Percy jumped, looking around for the source. It was behind him, somewhere in the shadows of a side alley.

"Look, friend," Percy replied, moving unconsciously toward the sound. "I'm sure that's quite flattering and all, but that's not how my bread's buttered, all right?"

"Never much cared for bread and butter," it said. "Always wanted a little red meat."

That was when it hit him. The thing, whatever it was, moved so fast Percy was never sure where it came from or how it took him so completely by surprise. It hit him again, hard enough to knock his glasses right off his face. He went down like a sack of potatoes.

"Oof," Percy said.

He tried to sit up but the creature was crouching over him. It pushed him hard against the damp pavement and made sure he stayed there.

"The blood of an Englishman," it whispered, laughing softly. "Still smells pretty good to me."

It leaned close and Percy had the sudden, horrible realization that it was going to bite him. He rolled over, bringing both hands up to ward it off. The creature, nothing more than a vague shadow backlit by the streetlight, hissed and scrabbled at Percy's hands with its long-nailed fingers. Percy kicked at it, taking advantage of the distraction to pull his wand from his pocket.

"Expelliarmus," he managed, and the force of spell knocked it from its feet.

He attempted to get up and run, but the thing recovered, overtaking him and knocking his feet out from under him. Percy hit the pavement again, taking the impact hard on the flats of his hands. It kicked him in the ribs, making a sound halfway between a screech and a curse. Percy rolled over, still struggling to get to his feet. The creature hit him hard in the back of the head and he went down again. He heard footsteps coming down the alley and tried to raise his head to call out.

"Stay down!" a familiar voice said.

Percy did. The creature staggered back a few steps and slammed into a brick wall. Percy turned his head in time to see Kingsley Shacklebolt sail overhead and sock it right in the mouth.

The thing got in a good shot or two, but mostly Shacklebolt was kicking its ass.

He had it cornered, and pulled out his wand with a flourish, but instead of casting a spell, Shacklebolt shifted around behind it and stabbed it straight through the heart with his wand. The thing collapsed in a shower of fine, grey dust.

He shook his head. "Sometimes the simplest ways are the most effective."

He walked over and offered Percy a hand. Pulled to his feet, Percy said, "Mr. Shacklebolt, thank you."

His eye was beginning to swell shut and he found he couldn't put full weight on his left ankle.

"Here, kid," Shacklebolt said, snatching something up off the ground and handing back Percy's glasses. "Let's get out of here."

"Mr. Shacklebolt-"

"Kingsley."

"All right then… Kingsley." Percy hobbled after him. "Was that- Was that what I thought it was?"

"It was if you thought it was a particularly nasty vampire."

"A vampire? Here in London? But the Ministry-"

"I know." Kingsley stopped, looking lost in thought.

"What is it?" Percy asked, stopping as well.

"There's only one reason I can think for one of those guys to be here."

"Not- Surely not You-Know-Who?"

Kingsley shrugged. "It wouldn't be the first time Voldemort called on dark creatures to do his dirty work." He paused. "But whatever it means, it's not good."

"I feel so idiotic," Percy said, shaking his head, "but the last thing I would have imagined was a vampire. Especially here."

"It could have happened to anyone. Still, lucky I was here."

"Why were you here anyway?" Percy asked, a sudden suspicion forming in his mind. "Were you following me?"

"No, I-" Kingsley began. "Listen, son, I just thought maybe you could use someone to talk to."

"I'm not your son, so I'd thank you not to speak to me as if I were. And I'm quite capable of taking care of myself."

"Oh, quite," Kinglsey murmured, a trace of irritation in his voice. "You know, kid, at some point you're going to have to learn how to accept help gracefully."

"I assure you, I am just fine on my own." Which would have been a whole lot more convincing if Percy's ankle hadn't chosen that exact moment to give out.

Kingsley grabbed him by the arm, holding him up. "Come on. Let's get you home."

*

The lights were on in Percy's flat when they reached it. He couldn't remember whether he'd left them on or whether that meant there was another unwelcome visitor waiting for them. At that point, Percy wasn't sure he cared much.

When they reached the building, Percy shook Kingsley's hand from his arm and hobbled up the front steps to unlock the door. He limped up the stairs to his flat, pointedly refusing any help. His black eye was beginning to swell in earnest, so he had a tendency to list slightly to the right as he walked. Kingsley followed, with the softest of exasperated sighs. They wrestled the door open only to find Ginny seated at the kitchen table, calmly waiting for the pair of them. Percy just barely stifled a groan.

Catching site of their appearance, though, Ginny jumped to her feet. "What happened? Are you all right?"

Percy flopped into a chair and didn't answer.

"We had a bit of a run-in," Kingsley said.

Ginny went over to the icebox and began pulling out the last of Percy's frozen food. "Death Eaters?" she asked, taking the wrapping from a cut of top sirloin.

"No. At least, not really."

"I wondered what was taking so long," she said, sitting down next to Percy and offering him the steak. "I'd been here awhile without hearing from you."

"Why are you here, anyway?" Percy asked.

"Oh, that's nice," Ginny sniffed, and clapped the steak to his eye with rather more than the necessary force. "You know what your problem is, Percy?"

"I have the suspicion you're about to tell me."

"Aside from the fact that somewhere around puberty you transformed into a massive pompous jerk, that is…"

Percy made a strangled and somewhat feeble noise of protest.

Ginny ignored him. "Your real problem is that you won't let anybody in." She pulled another steak from the icebox and began unwrapping it for Kingsley. "We're only trying to help. I've been so angry with you for the last year that I couldn't see straight, but I'm here, willing to help you if you'd only let me. The rest of the family would listen, too, if you'd only try to talk to them."

Percy sighed, squinting at his sister with his good eye. "It's not that simple, Ginny, and I think you know it."

"Maybe not, but at least it would be a start." Ginny handed over Percy's last steak to Kingsley, who looked, Percy noted, a lot worse for wear in the light.

"It got you, didn't it?"

"Look who's talking," Kingsley snapped, holding the frozen meat against his bruised cheek.

"I only meant, I didn't think it was able to hit you. You acquitted yourself very well."

"What was able to hit who now?" Ginny asked, sitting down again.

Kingsley sighed. "If I tell you, you've got to promise not to tell your mother. Okay?"

Ginny gave him a look. "I'm fifteen. You really think I'm telling my mother much of anything these days?"

Kingsley cracked a smile. "All right." He set the steak down on the table with a thunk. "We ran into a vampire."

"A vampire? In England?"

"That's what I said," Percy mumbled.

"Now, don't go saying anything about this till I have a chance to tell Dumbledore. I'm not sure what it means but it might have something to do with V-" At the look on Percy's face, he stopped. "Well, you know."

"Are you going to tell the Ministry?" Percy asked, even though he wasn't exactly sure why.

Kingsley looked thoughtful. "I suppose I'll have to. I can't have Aurors walking around out there without knowing there's a possibility of running into a vampire."

"It may have been a fluke."

"It may have." Kingsley stroked his chin thoughtfully. "But these days I'm not very inclined to believe in flukes, or coincidences. I'll just have to be very careful how I tell the Ministry." He looked at Percy. "And how much I tell them."

Percy shifted in his seat, bumping his ankle against a table leg, and winced.

"Let me take a look at that ankle," Kingsley offered.

Percy shook his head. "I can see to it," he said, too tired and sore to put any real annoyance behind the words. "You ought to get Ginny home. It's late and Mum will be... Well, it's late."

Kingsley watched Percy for another moment, then nodded. "Come on, Ginny, let's go."

"At least it looks like you managed to get out of bed today," Ginny said to him, and for once didn't slam the door behind her when she left.

His career assessment card from Waggley, Nystram and Nystram was still on the kitchen table, propped against the peppermill. Percy picked it up absently and stared at it for a few minutes without really seeing it.

He got up, taped the card to the icebox and thoughtfully poured himself a scotch.


	2. Mad Season

"Tell me, young Mr. Weasley. Why do you want to work for Ollivander's?"

It was stuffy in the office at the back of Ollivander's wand shop. The summer afternoon was hot; the leaded glass windows were sealed shut and the air full of dust. Percy fought the urge to tug at his collar.

"Well, sir, I've always had the greatest respect for Ollivander's as an institution of wizarding society."

"Have you?" Mr. Ollivander said, leaning back in his chair and steepling his fingers. "I remember you, young Mr. Weasley. Laurel oak and safat feather, I believe, wasn't it?"

"Yes, sir." A drop of sweat trickled down between Percy's shoulder blades and he suppressed a shiver.

Ollivander was still watching him, thoughtfully. "It takes a certain aptitude, Mr. Weasley, to fit the right wand to the right wizard. You could have it, I think. The question is whether you possess the passion -- the skill is useless without the passion."

Percy inhaled sharply, dust tickling his nose. "Is that so, sir?" he said, for want of anything more insightful.

"It is." Ollivander looked at him, a bit more shrewdly than made Percy strictly comfortable. "You have a lot of potential. That much has always been clear."

"Yes, sir?" Percy's nose itched insistently. He bit down on the inside of his cheek to suppress the urge to swipe at it.

Ollivander nodded sagely, confirming something more to himself, it appeared, than to Percy. "I'll leave you to think it over. Sleep on it, perhaps."

Percy sneezed.

*

Some beautiful women, it had been Percy's experience, were best viewed from afar. Proximity showed up their flaws, their artifice, their shallowness. Getting too close ruined the illusion, revealed their beauty as brassy and false.

Celia Williams was not one of those women.

The more time he spent with her, the more he appreciated her. She was smart, sensible, savvy and, yes, very attractive. Even on a rainy Thursday night at home, in ratty, faded jeans and a t-shirt, she was lovely and she knew it. Unlike most beautiful women Percy had known, however, she didn't use that knowledge to her advantage.

Williams' flat reflected her personality: chic, understated, with just a hint of pragmatism; done in charcoals and blues, with surprising bits of color in unexpected places. Percy approved of it. It was the sort of place he would have chosen for himself if he'd had the money.

He hadn't been able to figure what, if anything, a woman like Celia Williams saw in him, but he'd never been particularly interested in looking gift horses in the mouth.

She'd lit a fire in the small, deco ceramic-tiled fireplace in the living room. It was really too hot for it, but Percy found the fire comforting. Rain drummed on the windowpanes and roof, the fire popped and sizzled as the occasional raindrop found its way down the chimney. He stretched out near the hearth and watched the flickering of the flames.

Williams had an antique LP player that worked with actual electricity. (Percy couldn't help thinking how intriguing his father would have found it, but quickly pushed the thought aside.) It was thrown open casually on the hardwood floor and plugged into the wall behind the fireplace. (The electrical wiring didn't always work, Williams had explained, because of magical interference and the fact that it was a very old building. But she took what she could get.) She also had an impressive record collection. Propping himself on one elbow, Percy combed through it, picking out artists he'd never heard of and asking her about them while she fixed them both drinks.

"Oh, put this one on," she said, taking one titled _Time Out_ from his hands. "You'll like it. I guarantee."

Percy smiled. "You can predict what kind of music I'll like?"

"If you don't like Dave Brubeck, I'll throw you out onto the street."

"Ah," Percy replied, taking the record back and putting it gently onto the player. He hadn't quite gotten the hang of how to handle the tiny needle, but at least he didn't scratch anything when he lowered the arm.

Williams poured him a glass of port, then poured one for herself. "So, how goes the hunt?"

Percy groaned, accepting the glass. "Wretched."

She flung a pillow down beside him and flopped onto it, nearly upsetting her wineglass. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"I had an interview today." He took a sip from his glass. "But, God help me, I don't want to sell wands for a living."

Williams frowned, pushing a strand of dark hair out of her eyes. "I don't blame you."

"I probably should take it. I need the money, after all."

"It can't be as desperate as all that. We've only been out of work a few weeks."

Percy sighed. "True, but I can't help worrying. Eventually my savings are going to run out. If I spend all my time looking for the perfect job..."

Williams smiled sympathetically. "You're right, of course. But that doesn't mean you ought to take the first thing that comes along, either. Especially if you know it isn't right for you."

"Oh, enough of my woes," Percy said, taking another drink. "Tell me about your new position."

She smiled, a little ruefully he thought. "There's not much to tell. It's a political consulting outfit. Not exactly as prestigious as the Minister of Magic's private staff, but not a bad place to land, considering…"

"Well, congratulations again." He raised his glass to hers. She leaned in and clinked it against his.

"Thanks, Weasley."

"Any time, Williams."

She sipped thoughtfully at her drink, propping her chin on one hand. "Don't get discouraged about searching for a job. I expect there's something really spectacular waiting for you out there. You just have to figure out what it is and make the most of it."

"You know, someone said something similar to me just the other day."

"Really?"

"It's a rather funny story, actually. I had to sing- and I just realized that the only reason that story is funny is if you're laughing at me, not with me, and there's no way I'm going to finish it now."

Williams laughed. "They made you sing at Waggley, too? I just about walked out of the office."

"What did you sing?" Percy asked curiously.

She glanced sidelong. "I'll never tell."

"Why ever not?"

"A girl likes to preserve a little mystery, you know." She paused. "Plus, you'd probably laugh."

"I would never!"

"You say that now, because you don't know what it is. How do you like the Dave Brubeck?" she asked, deftly changing the subject.

"Is there any answer I can give that would be safe?"

"Did I really frighten you? If you don't like it, you can say so. I'm not so formidable as all that."

Percy shook his head. "I do like it."

"How is-" she hesitated slightly, "everything else?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, there was some talk. I mean, people said... things about your family."

"I don't know what you heard, but it was probably exaggerated."

"I heard that they disowned you over a political disagreement."

"All right, maybe not so exaggerated then..."

Her eyes widened a bit. "It's true? I thought- I guess I didn't think it possibly could be."

"There is," he admitted, "a bit more to it than simply that."

"But, still…" She shook her head. "My parents vote Labour exclusively, and they have yet to run me out of the family."

"Well, it's not as though the Labour party is in league with Voldemort."

She grinned. "I don't know about that."

"It's not just the politics. The wizarding community is so small. Everything one member of a family does affects every other member. It's nearly impossible to be your own person." He waited for Williams to say something, to stop him with some kindly-meant platitude, but she didn't. "Of course I love my family, I just can't-"

She sat up, leaning toward him. "I know, Weasley."

She was very close. He looked down. Her feet were bare, the toenails painted slate-blue -- the same color as her eyes.

"I should probably go," he said, standing up.

Williams raised an eyebrow. "Sure. I've got an early day anyway."

She stood as well, leaning in and taking the wineglass from Percy's hand. She looked up at him, watching him for a long moment, as though she was trying to figure him out. She moved a little closer and his breath caught in his throat.

"I ain't got nothin' but the blues," he said suddenly.

"What?"

"That's what I sang, for the career counselor. _I Ain't Got Nothin' But the Blues_."

She looked at him for a long moment, then began to laugh. "Really? How appropriate. Oh, poor, poor Weasley.”

"Well," he said. "You've laughed at me and I survived. How could your song possibly be worse?"

Williams took him by the arm and began to lead him toward the front door. "I'm not laughing at you. I just think it's so perfectly suited."

She opened the door and Percy paused. "Come on now. I've told you what I sang. It's only fair that you tell me yours."

"You'll have to be more persuasive than that, Weasley," she said with a wicked grin and shut the door behind him.

He was halfway home before it occurred to him to wonder exactly what she meant by that.

*

Ginny couldn't remember a summer as hot and oppressive as this one.

The house at Grimmauld Place smelled like dust and death, and Ginny just wanted out. They were living on top of each other, too many of them, with too many things that couldn't or wouldn't be said. Secrets hung in the air, like static electricity before a lightning storm. Doors were locked and shut, conversations came to abrupt halts whenever someone new walked into the room. There were whispers in the night that Ginny tried to convince herself were not ghosts or memories or monsters under the bed, but she wasn't always very successful.

She had thought when Hermione came to stay, about three weeks in to the summer holiday, that the tension might ease, but she was wrong. Ron and Hermione locked themselves away in an upstairs bedroom, saying little or nothing to anyone else in the house. At first, Ginny amused herself with the idea that they might be up to something naughty, then remembered who she was dealing with and discarded the notion as ridiculous. More than likely, they were up there obsessing about Harry – as usual.

So the house stayed quiet. The twins were gone. The adults crept in and out of the place like grim-faced shadows – except, of course, for Tonks and Kingsley, who were the only bright spots in Ginny's world that summer. Her mother didn't exactly approve, she knew, of either Tonks, who was clumsy and loud and made completely inappropriate jokes, or of Kingsley, who was good-looking, single, danger-prone and just young enough to be a credible threat to Ginny's virtue. (If her mother only knew…) But neither was around enough to really help. So Ginny cleaned and dusted and cooked and chopped and generally felt like a charwoman. Or Cinderella. If only Crookshanks would turn into a fairy godmother, or, better yet, a handsome prince.

If she didn't get out of there every once in a while, she was likely to scream out loud.

Not, of course, that anyone would let her go anywhere. Which was why, when the owl had come about Percy, addressed to _Any Member of the Weasley Family_ , she'd jumped at the chance. Without Kingsley as an ally, of course, she'd never have gotten past the front door, but he seemed to have taken a liking to her, and to have taken some sort of bizarre pity on Percy -- not that Percy deserved it.

It was afternoon, a few weeks after they'd rescued Percy from _The Welsh Green_ , and it was raining, dully and heavily, the rain not doing anything to disrupt the heat or the humidity. Crookshanks was curled up sleepily on the hearth, watching with one eye open while Ginny sliced up fruit for dinner. She stabbed viciously at an orange and wondered why none of the _men_ in the house ever had to help out in the kitchen. Couldn't Ron help get dinner for once?

The kitchen door opened and Ginny swung around, knife still in hand, to tell whichever member of her family was entering the room to grab a knife and help out. She stopped short, dropping the knife, when she caught sight of who it actually was.

"Kingsley!" she said. "I didn't know you were going to be here tonight!"

"The call of duty," he grinned. "Besides, the food here is better."

"Due in large part to me. You owe me."

He came over behind her, leaned in and neatly snagged a slice of cheese from a plate on the counter. She swatted half-heartedly at his hand.

"Couldn't live without you," he said with a wink. "I'd starve to death." There was an extended pause while Kingsley ate three slices of Stilton in rapid succession, then grabbed another. "What are you up to tomorrow?" he asked, grabbing a piece of bread to go with the cheese.

"Why?" she asked absently, shredding a head of cabbage into a bowl.

"I thought we might pay another visit to our friend in Belgravia."

"Huh?"

"You know," Kingsley said significantly. "Our _friend_. The one who can't hold his whiskey."

"Who? Percy?" she said. "Well, why didn't you just say so?"

Kingsley threw up his hands and flung himself into a chair at the table. "I give up, you know." He grabbed a knife from the table and neatly skewered a piece fruit from the platter. "This is a crazy house, full of crazy people."

"Who's crazy?"

"The lot of you. I never know from one minute to the next how any of you are going to react. Last week it was 'Oh, my brother's such a wanker. Don't mention him in front of my mum'," he said, in a high, squeaky imitation of Ginny's voice.

Ginny frowned at him. "That's just petty, and I do not sound like that." She turned back to the stove. "Why do you want to see him, anyway? Sure, we helped him once but-"

Kingsley shook his head. "Ginny, do you really think that your family is doing him any favors by cutting him out completely?"

" _He's_ the one who-"

"Doesn't matter," he cut her off abruptly. "That's how it starts, sure. He did this; they did that. But ten years from now, will it matter who did or said what? Will it matter two months from now?"

"But-"

"Do you trust me, kid?"

"Well," Ginny began hesitantly, "sure. Of course I trust you."

"Then you're just going to have to trust me on this, too. You won't regret it."

Ginny grinned. "You might."

Kingsley reached out a slightly sticky hand and mussed her hair. "Nah."

*

The next day wasn't any better. Hermione and Ron still weren't really talking to her, or anyone. Ginny didn't think they were doing it on purpose. They didn't even notice anyone else, and that actually made it worse. Her mother had an endless list of chores for her, as though keeping her busy would somehow keep her safe.

Kingsley came home at lunch, though, and Ginny brightened up considerably.

"I'm taking the afternoon," he said, relaxing at the table as Molly brought him a fresh cup of tea. "I thought we might go out, Ginny."

"Kingsley," her mother said warningly, "I'm not sure it's safe for Ginny to be wandering around outside."

Ginny sighed heavily. "It's broad daylight, Mum, and I just want to go for a walk. Or something. I'm going crazy stuck in here."

"It's all right, Molly," Kingsley said. "I'll be with her."

"Well," her mother said slowly, "I suppose it's all right, for a little while, as long as she's with you." She didn't look too excited about the prospect, but couldn't really refuse without insulting Kingsley. She'd been far more careful about that sort of thing, Ginny noticed, since Sirius died.

Ginny grabbed her bag, grabbed Kingsley by the hand and had them out the door before her mother could have second thoughts. They took a roundabout path to get to Percy's. Kingsley wandered expertly, seemingly aimlessly, in the direction of Percy's flat, trying to throw-off any would-be pursuers.

"Do you really think someone might follow us?" Ginny asked. Her feet hurt; the sandals she was wearing weren't exactly practical for hiking all over London.

 _Next time_ , she thought, _I'll wear sensible shoes... Who am I kidding? No, I won't._

By the time they got there (and up several excruciatingly long flights of stairs), Ginny had three shiny, new blisters. Kingsley knocked on the door.

"It's open," Percy said weakly.

They pushed the door open and went inside. Percy was splayed on the sofa, his head on the rolled arm, staring unblinkingly at the ceiling. A quill and parchment lay discarded on the side table.

"What are you up to, Percy?" Ginny asked.

"Slowly starving to death, if you must know," he said, not bothering to move.

"What's the matter with you?"

"I just turned down an offer of employment. It may be the single stupidest thing I've ever done."

"I doubt _that_ ," Ginny muttered, but quieted down when Kingsley yanked hard on a lock of her hair.

"What was the job?" Kingsley asked, taking a seat on the sofa beside Percy.

"With Ollivander's, selling wands."

Ginny made a face. "Well, no wonder you said no. Who wants to work in _retail_?"

Kingsley gave her a look, and she had the sense that if he'd been closer he might have yanked her hair out by the roots this time.

"You don't have to take the first thing that comes along, you know," Kingsley said, attempting to look wise. "It's not as though there's a shortage of work-"

"But I was sacked," Percy said. "Nobody will want to hire someone who's been sacked." He sat forward, putting his face in his hands. "I don't even know what it is I would like to be doing."

"There has to be something."

"Yes," Percy said, "there was. I wanted to work for the Ministry of Magic. I'd wanted it since I was a very small child."

"Well, you've gotta expand your horizons now. Nothing wrong with that." Kingsley patted him manfully on the shoulder. "You just have to figure out what you want, and go after it."

"I want a jam doughnut," Ginny offered helpfully. Kingsley looked appalled.

"That does sound good," Percy said, surprising them both. "There's a bakery around the corner, if you'd like."

So they went. Kingsley paid, a fact they all pretended to ignore. The doughnuts were fresh and hot, and the coffee better than average.

"Since when do you drink black coffee?" Percy asked her. "It will stunt your growth."

Ginny hooked her feet around the legs of her chair. "My growth is stunted anyway. I'm never going to be any taller than this, no matter what. Just look at Mum."

"How-" Percy flushed a delicate pink beneath his freckles. "How is she? How is... everyone?"

"Fine," Ginny lied, then immediately regretted it. "Well, mostly fine – as fine as they can be, considering."

"Ah."

Ginny went up to the counter and bought a second doughnut. When she came back to the table, she said, "Everybody's okay, though, Percy. They're worried, they're unhappy, but they're all right."

"Thank you, Ginny."

"Any time," she said, and smiled at her brother for the first time in what felt like years. "Now, pass the coffee pot."

*

On Saturday morning, Ginny wandered downstairs, a letter from Dean in one hand and four of the homemade molasses cookies she'd stolen from the kitchen the previous night in the other. She turned at the landing and nearly tripped over Ron and Hermione who were crouched there in the shadows, eavesdropping on the adults talking in the parlor.

"What the-" Ginny had to grab hold of the banister to keep from pitching forward down the stairs.

"Shh!!" both Ron and Hermione hissed at her.

"What is going on?" Ginny whispered, but they just waved at her to be quiet.

It couldn't be anything that important, Ginny thought. Not if the adults were talking about it right out here. Order meetings were always held behind closed doors, complete with secrecy spells and anti-eavesdropping charms.

"And Shacklebolt?" someone said from the parlor. Ginny started and leaned in closer to hear.

"He didn't check in last night..."

"Has anyone checked with the Ministry?"

"It's too soon. We can't without it looking too suspicious."

Ginny's blood turned to ice. She leaned her head against the wooden bars of the banister. Ron was looking sidelong at her, but she pretended not to notice.

It didn't work.

"What do you know about this, Gin?"

Hermione turned to look at her as well.

"Nothing," Ginny managed. "Not really."

Hermione gave her a look that said she didn't believe a word of it, and that nettled Ginny for some reason.

"Oh, I'm sorry. You two go ahead and keep all kinds of secrets from the rest of us, but let me do it and suddenly-"

"What are you talking about, Ginny?" Ron looked genuinely perplexed.

The door to the parlor opened then, and Hermione grabbed them both by the arms and dragged them back up the stairs, even further into the shadows.

"Keep your voice down, Ron," she said.

"What are you talking about?" he asked again, more quietly this time, turning back to Ginny.

"I'm talking about you two. All summer, all you've done is whisper and skulk around acting like you know things the rest of us don't!"

"We do not skulk!" Ron said.

"Ginny," Hermione began, in the maddeningly reasonable tone of voice she used with first years and house elves. "We're just worried about Harry. Surely you understand that?"

Ginny rolled her eyes. "Of _course_ I do. That's why it's so annoying."

"What do you mean?"

"Huh?" Ron added insightfully.

"I know I'm not as close to Harry as you are, but I still care what happens to him." At this, Ron began to look hopeful. Ginny pointedly ignored him. "And maybe I haven't fought as much evil as the three of you have, but I was there with all of you at the Ministry in June and- and Kingsley is my friend, damn it!" she said, appalled to discover that she was close to tears.

"Ginny," Hermione said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

"Yeah, Gin. I'm sure Dad and the others will be able to help Kingsley." He patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. "They know what they're doing."

"But you heard them," Ginny said. "They _aren't_ going to help."

"Of course they will," Hermione said, matter-of-factly. "They're the good guys."

 _Right_ , Ginny thought, _they're the same good guys who let Dad get bitten by a giant snake. The same good guys who let Sirius get killed_.

"Oh, this isn't helping anything!" she said, shaking both of them off and starting carefully down the stairs. She needed to do something, and she needed to do it before it was too late. She looked around the corner, first one way, then the other. The parlor door was closed again and there were muffled voices coming from the direction of the kitchen. The coast appeared, for the moment, to be clear. She made a run for it.

"Where are you going?" Ron whispered fiercely. "Ginny! Come back!"

"To help Kingsley! If the Order won't do it, I know someone who will!"

The last thing she heard before the front door clicked softly shut, was a hissed, "I'm telling Mum!"

*

Percy was in the middle of a very good Saturday afternoon nap, accompanied by very good dreams, dreams in which he was gainfully employed, well-fed, well-dressed and in love with a dark-haired girl who sang in the shower. So, he was understandably upset when someone woke him by banging repeatedly on his front door.

"Open the door, Percy!" his sister said from the hallway. "I know you're in there! You've got to be, you haven't anywhere else to go!"

"Didn't anyone," Percy said, standing up but not opening the door, "ever teach you that it's nearly impossible to catch flies with vinegar?"

"Open the door, you _massive wanker_!"

Percy opened the door. "If you've just come over to insult me, you needn't b-"

"Kingsley's gone," she interrupted, pushing her way into the flat.

"What?"

"You heard me. Gone. Vanished. Disappeared in the line of duty."

On closer inspection, Percy could see that Ginny was white to the lips. She sat, wringing her hands. "No one will do anything about it, either," she continued. "They're too afraid of drawing attention to him, for whatever good that will do if he's really in trouble-"

"Drawing attention to him?"

"Because of-" she stopped abruptly. "Well, never mind why."

"If you mean because he's one of Dumbledore's undercover agents within the Ministry, I already figured that out. Do give me some credit," Percy snapped.

"I just thought you could help," she said miserably, and Percy immediately felt guilty.

"Oh, Ginny," he said, sitting down beside her. She was huddled in on herself and he was reminded of her as a very small girl, with scraped knees or pulled pigtails. "I'll see what I can do."

*

It was still raining, sluggishly, making the afternoon long, grey and dreary. The heavy air clung to Percy's clothes and dampened his hair as he walked. He turned his collar up to keep out the rain. It mostly worked.

 _Michel's_ , more familiarly known as "Mike's," was a trendy, corner bar frequented by the younger generation of Ministry workers. It was not the place Percy would have chosen for a clandestine meeting. He was bound to see people he knew. But Luke had insisted they meet there, and Percy was hardly in a position to make demands. Once inside, though, he was pleasantly surprised. The bar was almost completely deserted. Apparently, Mike's wasn't as popular on the weekends as it was during weekday happy hour.

"Thanks for meeting me, Luke," Percy said, sliding into a corner booth that was conveniently hidden from both the door and the bar. "I appreciate it."

"How could I refuse?" Luke grinned. "This is the most excitement I've had in weeks." He pushed a drink across the table. "I ordered for you. Scotch and soda, right?"

"Thanks," Percy said, taking a drink.

"And then there's this." Luke handed over a thick roll of parchment, sealed with Ministry wax.

"What's this?"

"A copy of Shacklebolt's last field report. I'm not sure what help it will be but-"

Percy broke the seal and began to skim through it. "This is fantastic! How did you get your hands on it?"

Luke looked pleased with himself. "It took some doing, but I called in a few favors." He grinned. "Plus, now I have a date with one of the girls down in Files and Records. You know what they say about those Files and Records girls..."

"Way to take one for the team, Luke."

He grinned widely. "Any time, Perce, any time." He paused. "We miss you at the Ministry, you know. A lot of people think you, Williams and the others got a really raw deal."

"Thanks, I appreciate it."

"How is Williams, anyway?" he asked, a little too casually.

"Why would you ask me?" Percy responded carefully.

"Oh, come on, Weasley! We've all heard the scuttlebutt." He leaned over and punched Percy on the shoulder. "Good job, mate. She's absolutely corking."

"Ah, yes. Well," Percy said, floundering around for a way to change the subject, "thank you for the files. They will be very helpful."

"Why do you need to know all this, anyway?"

Percy paused. "Let's just say it's a family matter."

Luke's eyebrows rose just fractionally. "I see." He took a long drink from his pint. "You just have the one sister, right?"

"Yes. What does that have to do-" Percy's eyes widened as he got it. "I assure you, that isn't what this is about."

"Okay, okay," Luke said, holding his hands up in surrender. "You can hardly blame me, though. Shacklebolt does have a bit of a reputation."

Percy hadn't known that.

"Anyway," he said, trying to push any possible suspicions about Kingsley and Ginny out of his mind. (She _had_ been awfully distraught about his disappearance, though. Hadn't she?) "I'd better get going. I don't want to run the risk of getting you into any trouble."

"I'm always in trouble," Luke said, shaking Percy's hand as he got up to leave. "We should all get together sometime, somewhere away from the Ministry's prying eyes."

"And where exactly would that be?" Percy said dryly.

Luke laughed. "I was thinking Majorca, or maybe Amsterdam."

"I doubt we'd be safe even there."

"Anyway, think about it. You and Williams, me, some of the old crowd from Hogwarts..."

"The girl from Files and Records?" Percy asked, grinning.

"Maybe. Ask me again after my date tonight."

"It sounds like a good time, Luke. We'll have to do it."

"Definitely. Good luck with whatever this thing is with Shacklebolt, by the way."

"Thanks," Percy said, tucking the parchment into his jacket and turning up his collar again. "I may need it."

*

"So I thought if I retraced his steps, following the field report from his last case, I'd have a good chance of finding out where he's gone," Percy finished, feeling rather proud of himself as he looked up at his little sister.

"No, no, no," Ginny said, practically bouncing on the balls of her small feet. "Definitely a bad idea."

"If you have any other suggestions, I'd love to hear them."

"Well, no," she said, moving to the stove and fiddling with the teapot to cover her anxiety. The gesture was so like their mother that Percy had to swallow hard.

He'd left Ginny at his flat all day, while he'd pounded the pavement and called in favors to get information about Kingsley, and had come home to three dozen freshly baked cookies, two pies and an alphabetized bookshelf. Compulsive housework, apparently, ran in the family.

"How else did you think I was going to help, Ginny? Why did you come if you didn't want me to try and find him?"

"I didn't- I didn't think, I guess." She collapsed into a chair. "I just wanted someone to do something. Now I'm not so sure that involving you was a good idea."

"I see," Percy said coldly.

"Well, it's not like you have any experience at this sort of thing. You might get yourself killed, or worse!"

"One might almost think you care what happens to me," he snapped.

And that was when she hit him.

Not hard, just enough of a smack to get his attention. "You _moron_ ," she said, thwapping him on the shoulder several more times for good measure. "No matter what you do; no matter how big an idiot you make of yourself, I would care if you died. We _all_ would. How could you think anything else?"

"Ow," Percy said.

"Oh, shut up. That could not possibly have hurt."

"Ginny," he said, taking her by the shoulders and making her sit down at the table. "I am not going to do anything dangerous. I am going to go and look at the places Kingsley went before he disappeared. I am going to look around, hopefully find something helpful and then I am going to come right back here."

Ginny nodded slowly, but her hands were still twisting in her lap.

"I know you aren't happy about this-" Percy began.

"Just _find_ him, and I'll be happy."

"Ginny, Kingsley is in a very dangerous line of work, after all-"

"If you tell me that I ought to get used to losing people, I will hit you for real," she said sharply. Clearly, he'd hit a nerve. "You don't just get used to that, not if you have any kind of heart." She took a deep breath. "Maybe people do die, pointlessly and stupidly, but that doesn't mean we ought to pretend it doesn't matter! That doesn't mean we ought to sit around and talk about the greater good and act as though they never existed at all!"

Percy gaped at her. There was, obviously, more going on with his family than he was aware of.

"But you told me," he said slowly, "that everyone was all right, didn't you?"

Ginny looked up. "What? Oh, yes. Just ignore me. I just- There are things you don't know, Percy, and maybe it's better that you don't."

Another day he would have pressed the issue, but not just then. "Then we're agreed," he said instead, getting up and tucking his wand through his belt. "I'll go and check things out, and if I find anything-"

"If you find anything, owl for help right away," Ginny said. "Don't be a hero."

"I promise to take Hermes with me," he said. "I'll be very careful, and owl you when I find anything." He paused. "I've come this far, I might as well see the thing through to the end."

*

The trail led, rather predictably, to an abandoned warehouse in a bad part of town.

Kingsley, he'd discovered through the field reports, had been tracking the vampire they'd run into that first night in the alley. Apparently, there was a lot of suspicious vampire movement all over Europe, and more vampire sightings reported in England than there had been in around sixty years.

He would never have said so to Ginny, but he didn't think it very likely that Kingsley was still alive. Whether he found Kingsley or not, he wanted to find out what the vampires were up to. He felt very personally about this, though he wasn't sure if it was just because of Kingsley or also the fact that a vampire had very recently tried to eat him.

This was the last place Kingsley had gone before he disappeared. Percy didn't really expect to find anything, he hadn't found anything at the string of seedy bars and pawnshops he'd been to earlier. Yes, they remembered Kingsley (a fact which most of the patrons would only divulge after Percy bought a round of drinks or handed over a Galleon or two) but they didn't have much to offer beyond that. Percy didn't expect this place to be much different. But as long as there was a chance, Percy would keep looking.

He scribbled a note quickly and handed it over to the owl on his shoulder. He'd promised Ginny, after all. Not that there was much to tell her. This place looked completely deserted.

Hermes hooted worriedly, kneading Percy's wrist a shade too roughly with his talons.

"It' all right, Hermes," he said softly, stroking the bird's feathers. "I'll be all right. You just take this to Ginny. Go now."

The owl took flight and Percy pushed the door quietly open. He would just have a look around first, see if the vampires had left any clues behind. Perhaps there would be some sign of Kingsley as well, something that might indicate whether he was still alive or not.

All of which would have been a very good plan if the vampires hadn't still been there. One reached out and grabbed Percy by the throat. He squawked helplessly as it lifted him effortlessly off the ground.

"What have we here?" it said.

"A pureblood, by the smell of it," said a second vampire, leaning in and deftly taking away Percy's wand.

Percy couldn't see them very well. The warehouse was dimly lit and the lack of oxygen getting to his brain had begun to affect his vision.

"Don't kill it," the second vampire said. "It needs to breathe, after all."

The pressure on his throat eased, and the vampires dragged him deeper into the warehouse. He had the sense of other creatures around him, but they were nothing more than shadows in the gloom. They made little noise, milling around the edges of his vision in a silent crowd.

Percy had seen a Dementor once and thought it was the most terrifying thing he'd ever experienced. This was far worse.

The crowd parted for them, and they made their way to the front of a large room.

"What do you have for us tonight?" a low voice asked. "A child?"

"Its blood is pure," the first vampire said. "Untainted by mixing."

"Ah. Good," said yet another vampire, apparently the leader. "We will keep it. Put it with the other."

And they dragged him off again before he could even ask the leader to explain his master plan, since they were going to kill him anyway.

 _Well, all right_ , Percy thought. _Plan B, then._

"Ah, excuse me," he said to the vampire that had hold of the back of his neck. "Why exactly are you going to kill me again?"

"We serve the Dark Lord," the vampire said.

"And you do that how, exactly? Does the Dark Lord have any big plans for you? Any special death and destruction coming up in the next few days?"

"We serve the Dark Lord," it said again, sounding a bit put out.

"That's, well... Good for you," Percy said. "Yay Dark Lord! Way to eat death! Um, sig heil? Ow."

One of the vampires cuffed him across the face. Another tied rough cords tightly around his wrists and ankles, then flung him through the door into a small, dark room.

"Ow," Percy said again.

"Tell me about it," Kingsley Shacklebolt said from the far corner.

As Percy's eyes adjusted to the light, he could make out Kingsley leaning against the opposite wall. He looked far worse for wear, but very definitely alive.

"You're alive!" Percy said unnecessarily.

"For the moment." Kingsley grinned a bit too widely. "Our friends out there decided I'd make a better henchman than an appetizer. From the looks of it, they decided the same about you."

"What exactly do you mean by that?"

"They're going to turn us." A pause. "Into vampires, like them."

"Absolutely not," Percy said, after a moment. "I categorically refuse. I've no desire to be a vampire."

"I don't think they were planning on giving us much choice in the matter, kid."

Kingsley took a deep breath. It seemed to hurt him to do so. Percy scooted over as close to him as he could get.

"Are you all right?"

"I took a few hits, but I've seen worse." He focused on Percy. "What are you doing here, anyway?"

"Ginny was worried. So I found out what case you'd been working on and followed up on your leads."  
"You decided to search for me? Why didn't you just go to someone at the Ministry?"

"There was some... concern... about that, apparently. I was afraid of compromising whatever it is you've been working on.

"And so you decided to just waltz in here, all by yourself?" Kingsley asked, looking appalled. "What a brilliant plan!"

"I wasn't expecting to actually find you here!" Percy exclaimed defensively. "I was looking for clues!"

"Oh, _clues_ ," Kingsley said. "Well, nice going, Sam Spade."

"I hardly think there's any reason to get shirty with me," Percy said, sitting up as straight as he could without falling over. "I was only trying to help, after all."

Kingsley sighed. "I know you were, kid."

There was a long silence.

Then, Percy said, "They're really going to turn us into vampires?"

"That seems to be what they're after." Kingsley shook his head. "Just wish I knew why."

"I did try to get some answers out of them before they put me in here-"

"Not a talkative bunch, are they?"

"Not particularly." Percy's muscles were beginning to spasm. He tried to stretch out his legs to no avail. "I didn't get the impression that they were particularly, well, bright vampires, either."

"You think Voldemort could get the smart ones to follow him?" Kingsley laughed dryly. "Fat chance."

"What does he plan to do with them then?" A pause. "What does he plan to do with us?"

"Foot soldiers, I think. They seem real concerned about only turning purebloods. My guess is that's to swell the ranks."

"Expendable soldiers," Percy said, shaking his head.

"But only ones with a pedigree."

Percy was silent again for another long moment, slumping against the wall and staring blankly into the darkness.

"What is it?" Kingsley finally asked.

"I think I've just begun to panic."

"Don't worry. I have a plan," Kingsley said.

"Oh, thank God! I thought we were done for. What's your plan?"

"When they come to get us, we jump them, dust them and then run like hell."

"Not," Percy began carefully, "to criticize your plan, but there are certain logistic difficulties with it..."

"Like?"

"Like how we're going to get untied, for one thing." He sat up a little straighter. "And what exactly we're going to kill them _with_. I don't suppose they left your wand?"

Kingsley shook his head.

"Mine either," Percy said. "And there's nothing made of wood in here, in case you hadn't noticed."

"Well, I didn't say it was a _good_ plan," Kingsley grumbled. "I haven't actually had any food or water for two days. Plus, there're the repeated blows to the head. I may not be thinking too clearly."

"Possibly not," Percy replied dryly.

"You got something better?"

"Why does everyone keep asking me that today?" Percy snapped. "We'll think of something. We have to. Have you been able to discover anything about their plans?"

"They've got some big ceremony planned. Just before sunrise from what I could make out. A blood feast or a black mass, typical melodramatic vampire stuff." He smiled grimly. "Guess we're the main course, though."

"I've never been much for gallows humor," Percy said crisply.

"Why, oh why, am I not surprised?" Kingsley settled back against the wall. "Well, kid, we've got till dawn to come up with something to save our skins. So get thinking."

*

Just before dawn, however, the building caught fire.

"We are either the most spectacularly lucky bastards in the history of luck," Kingsley said, "or somebody's found us."

"I fail to see how being burned to death while bound hand and foot in a locked cupboard is lucky," said Percy, blinking hard against the smoky air.

"Would you rather burn to death or become a vampire?"

"Do you want my honest answer?"

Kingsley opened his mouth to retort, but just then the door blew open, showering the pair of them with metal shavings.

"It's clear!" a voice said from the doorway.

"It's Shacklebolt!" said another. "You lucky bastard."

Two men came forward and loosed the ropes binding them. Percy rubbed his wrists and tried to stand.

"Come on. We've got to get you out of here."

They hurried out of the storage room and into the corridor. It was utter chaos. Aurors ran along the hallway, shouting instructions to one another. Several piles of dust marked the cement floor where vampires had been. Percy's eyes were swimming with tears from the smoke and every breath burned his throat.

"Through here!" someone said.

"You keeping up, kid?" Kingsley turned back to look at Percy over his shoulder.

Percy just nodded and continued toward the double doors that led to the main warehouse. He made it, but in the confusion he lost sight of Kingsley and fumbled his way through the doorway alone.

The main room of the warehouse was full of smoke and bodies, some fighting, some running, more than a few turning to dust under the spells of the twenty or so Aurors who had just kicked the doors in and swarmed over the place.

A red flame streaked past Percy, narrowly missing his cheek, and slammed into a vampire that had been sneaking up on him from behind. It fell to its knees, then turned to ash.

Percy stepped hastily back… and nearly collided with a pair of large, angry vampires, one of whom appeared to have his and Kingsley's wands tucked in his belt.

"Hey!" Percy said, running after the pair without thinking. The only thought in his head was getting his wand back and getting the hell out of there.

They stopped, turning toward him in surprise.

Remembering what he'd seen Kingsley do against that first vampire, he ran up to the one with their wands at his belt and socked it in the face. Luckily, he had surprise on his side. The vampire stepped back, shocked, and Percy grabbed both wands. When it recovered and lunged at him, Percy skewered it neatly through the heart.

It collapsed into dust at his feet, and Percy stood there for a moment in disbelief.

"Nice work, kid!" Kingsley called from a few feet away, snapping Percy back to reality. "Now don't get cocky."

Percy barely had time to duck as the second vampire swung a large, meaty fist at him. He tripped and fell flat, knocking into a half-dozen cans stacked neatly against the wall. When he opened his eyes, he was at eye-level with the labels: blue paint, white paint, paint thinner. Percy reached out and grabbed for the can of paint thinner with his free hand, still holding his wand in the other.

The vampire hauled him to his feet.

"Incendio!" Percy cried, pointing his wand rather feebly at the huge vampire. The tiniest of orange flames took hold of the lapel of its impressively ugly jacket.

"You think that will do anything to me?" the vampire laughed, brushing lightly at the flame as though it were a minor annoyance.

"Perhaps not," Percy said. "But this might." He flung the contents of the canister of paint thinner at the vampire with all his might.

It let out a somewhat surprised 'oof,' popped, sizzled and disappeared.

"Everybody out!" someone called from behind Percy. "This place is going up!"

The flames had reached the ceiling by then, but luckily the main entrance remained clear. Kingsley jogged over, ash on his clothes and a fresh laceration across his chin, caught Percy by the arm and lugged him outside.

*  
The warehouse went spectacularly up in flames, collapsing in on itself, sending burning ash into the pre-dawn sky.

Kingsley Shacklebolt felt like hell.

"I'm getting too old for this, Andy," he said, turning to one of his Auror colleagues.

"Bullshit," Andy said. "You're two years younger than I am."

"It's not the years, it's the mileage," they said at the same time, laughing at the old joke.

The mileage was starting to catch up with Kingsley these days. Three days in the tender, loving hands of a pureblood vampire cult aside, he was bone tired.

"Glad to see you're all right," Andy said. "Assuming, of course, that you don't burst into flames when the sun comes up."

"Oh, very funny." They'd tested both he and Percy with garlic, crosses and holy water before bothering to patch them up. If that didn't convince the Aurors they were still among the living, Kingsley didn't know what would.

"How did you find us, anyway?" he asked, stretching his sore shoulders. The vampires' ropes had burned red welts into his wrists.

"Got a tip," Andy said, checking his notes. "From a Miss A. Nonymous."

"Really," Kingsley said, making a mental note to have a chat with Ms. Nonymous just as soon as he got back to Grimmauld Place.

Speaking of which... Kingsley ambled (all right, he admitted to himself, hobbled) over to where Percy was being seen to by an emergency healer.

"How're you doing?" he asked.

The kid looked up; a bruise was blossoming vividly across his left cheek. "Every time we go somewhere, I end up bleeding."

"Sorry about that. It comes with the territory." Kingsley reached out and helped Percy to his feet. "You got a couple vampires in there, you know, and got 'em good."

"I did, didn't I?" Percy said, looking faintly amazed.

"How does it feel?"

"I feel like hell."

"Come on, Percy," Kingsley said, slapping the kid on the shoulder. "I'll buy you a drink."


	3. Kings for July

Weird things, Percy had learned early on, were wont to happen in his life. He didn't like it, he never had, but weird was pretty much par for the course when you were growing up Weasley. Weird was just a fact of life, right alongside noisy, poor, crowded, hectic and sticky.

None of that, however, prepared him for the very bizarre turn his life was about to take.

It started at breakfast, with the post. He didn't usually get much, apart from bills. That morning there was a note from Celia, which made him happier than maybe it should have. He was beginning to worry about the strength of his attachment to her. Percy had, after all, already been in love once, and, in honesty, it hadn't been much to his taste. Falling in love with Celia Williams, while tempting, had not been part of the plan – then again, neither had getting sacked.

He put Celia's letter aside, promising himself that he wouldn't open it until after he finished breakfast. The only other piece of mail was a small, thick envelope addressed in expensive calligraphy. He flipped it over. The return address was Waggley, Nystram and Nystram.

 _Dear Mr. Weasley,_

 _Thank you for choosing Waggley, Nystram and Nystram's premium career placement service._

 _We have taken the liberty of scheduling your first interview. You will find the details enclosed. If the date and time chosen does not work for you, we have also included your prospective employer's contact information. Please contact them directly if you need to reschedule._

 _Best of luck with your career search!_

 _Sincerely,  
Sascha Lightbody   
Assistant Career Specialist_

Also included in the envelope were a description of the position he was to interview for and a card of general "Interview Tips" that included such helpful ideas as 'Be on time,' 'Take a shower' and 'Don't insult the interviewer's mother, even if he/she insults yours first.'

Percy put his mug down with a thunk, stood up and headed to the fireplace.

The witch manning Waggley, Nystram and Nystram's floo connection barely looked up when Percy popped up amidst the flames of their extra-large open hearth. If anything, she seemed mildly bored.

Percy waved his letter at her to get her attention. "Excuse me, miss? I'm sorry. I think there must have been some mistake -- I never signed up for this service."

The witch yawned, finally looking up at him. "All right, Mr-?"

"Weasley."

"All right, Mr. Weasley. Who is your career counselor?"

"Sascha Lightbody."

"One moment please." The witch pressed a button on her desk, and Sascha appeared almost immediately.

"That's fine, Megan," she said. "I'll take it from here." She smiled at Percy. "Hello again, Mr. Weasley. What can I do for you?"

"I received this letter this morning." He thrust the letter out of the fireplace and in her general direction. "I never signed up for this. I didn't ask for anyone to set up any interviews for me."

She reached out and took the parchment from him, scanning it briefly. After a moment, she looked up. "Technically, that's true. However, your complimentary career assessment included one free placement opportunity."

"I never asked for one!" he said helplessly. "And if I had, it certainly wouldn't be this one."

Sascha frowned. "I think you'll find this well worth your time, Mr. Weasley."

"I don't know if you noticed, but I am not a singer! I have no musical training or experience."

Sascha shook her head. "Your career assessment indicated you had talent in this direction. Our career assessments are never wrong. Waggley, Nystram and Nystram prides itself on one hundred percent accuracy."

"What happens if I don't show up for this thing?"

She frowned again, more darkly. "It's entirely voluntary, of course. But I have to stress again, Mr. Weasley, that this is a unique opportunity for you. I hand-picked this employer myself based on the results of your career assessment. Besides," she paused, seeming to choose her words carefully, "it could be very helpful for you to go to this interview."

"Just why is this so important to you, anyway?" Percy asked.

Sascha smiled. "Because, Mr. Weasley, whether you know it or not, you have an exceptionally fine aura. I expect great things from you."

*

Ginny woke up on Tuesday morning to discover Harry Potter in bed with her.

He was curled up at the end of the bed like a cat, his head pillowed on her left foot. He was snoring loudly, and Ginny couldn't be sure from this angle, but it was entirely possible that he was drooling. There was only one thing for it: Ginny rolled over and kicked him in the head.

"Ow." Harry jerked awake abruptly. "Wha-?"

"Good morning, Harry," Ginny said, propping herself up on one elbow. "Care to explain what you're doing here?"

"Huh?" Harry said, blinking rapidly.

"Why," Ginny began again, speaking very slowly and clearly, "are you in my room?"

Harry sat up so quickly he nearly fell off the bed. "Did I do it again?"

"Do what exactly?"

"Sleepwalk." He ran a hand through his exceptionally messy hair, which, considering this was Harry, was saying something. "I've been sleepwalking."

"Oh."

"Just lately," he said, sounding a bit defensive.

"I didn't think you were supposed to be here until this afternoon," Ginny said, leaning back against the pillows.

"They came and got me last night. I'm not sure why." He paused. "Nothing's happened, has it? I mean, nothing bad?"

"Not that I know of," Ginny said. "Not that that means anything."

Harry laughed bitterly, rolling over to lie on his back. "Yeah."

He lay there for a few moments, not speaking. Ginny began to wonder whether she'd said the wrong thing. But all Harry said when he spoke was "Where's Hermione? I thought this was her room, too."

"Oh, she's probably been up for hours. She doesn't approve of sleeping in."

"But it's summer holiday," Harry said, incredulously.

"And _you_ don't have to share a room with her." Ginny leaned over the side of the bed and grabbed her stuffed rabbit from where it had fallen during the night. She hugged Dr. Floppenstein to her chest and stared up at the ceiling.

"So, how are you, Harry?"

He sighed heavily. "About how you'd expect, I guess. Voldemort still wants to kill me, Sirius is still dead and my cousin is still built like an angry and not particularly bright rhinoceros."

"Is there another kind? Of rhinoceros, I mean?" She looked over at Harry, who very nearly cracked a smile at that.

"No, I don't suppose there is. I'm glad to be here, at any rate." Harry watched her for a long moment, as though debating saying something else. Just as it was about to get really uncomfortable, he said, "Is that a stuffed bunny rabbit you've got there?"

"Harry!" The door to Ginny's room burst open and Ron slid through in nothing but his socks and pair of boxer shorts. "Harry! Don't do that to me. I thought you'd gone- I thought you were-" He stuttered to a halt. "Why are you in here?"

"Hermione and I are giving him an avocado facial," Ginny said tartly. "What does it look like?"

"Nice. Glad to see you're in your usual fine form this morning, Gin."

"Always," Ginny said, flinging the covers back and getting out of bed. She wandered over to the small vanity she shared with Hermione. She had to push Hermione's Body Shop Oatmeal Scrub back over to her side of the vanity. For someone so organized (and who owned so few quality skin care products), Hermione's stuff sure seemed to take up a lot of space. Ginny sat with a sigh (after moving a stack of arithmancy books from the room's only chair) and picked up her brush.

Ron sat down next to Harry. "Don't disappear like that on me, mate. You nearly gave me a heart attack."

Ginny turned from brushing her hair to explain exactly how Harry had gotten into her room in the first place. Harry caught her eye and shook his head slightly. Ginny frowned and turned back to the vanity, watching the two boys in the mirror as she combed tangles out of her hair.

"I'll try not to give you too many scares this summer, Ron," Harry said, forcing a smile. "I'm just glad to be here."

"Well, come on then," Ron said, slapping the mattress with one hand as he stood up. "Let's go get some breakfast."

"You might want to consider putting some pants on first," Ginny said mildly, without looking over her shoulder.

Ron looked down. "Oh, damn it. Tell Mum I'll be down in a minute, won't you?" He dashed across the hall to the room he shared with Harry.

Ginny put her brush down and walked over to the door where Harry was waiting for her. "Why didn't you tell him about the sl-" Harry frowned darkly at her. "About the- the thing," she finished lamely.

"Because if I tell Ron, he'll tell Hermione."

"And?"

"And then there will be lectures and advice and arguments and we'll end up not speaking to each other for days at a stretch."

Ginny blinked. "But they're your best friends!"

"Yeah, well, they hover," Harry said, not looking at her. "So you have to promise not to tell. Not anyone. Not your mum. Not even Dean."

"Uh, sure, I promise. If you're sure that's what you want."

"I am very, very sure," Harry said firmly, holding the door open for her. "Now let's have some breakfast."

"Come on, you two," Ron called from the stairs. "Let's eat. I'm starving, and Hermione has probably stolen all the crispy bacon already."

*

 _Fatum Fortuna_ was not the sort of club Percy would ever have gone to of his own accord. It was cramped and moodily lit, with a permanent scent of stale smoke and spilled liquor hanging about the plush seats and velvet curtains. Percy stood in the doorway, holding the beaded hangings to one side, feeling entirely out of his element.

A slight, swarthy man with a clipboard came jogging up. "You Weasley?"

Percy nodded.

"Nice to meet you," the man said, offering a hand. "I'm Sal. That's Lana." He gestured at a sleek woman with a trendy, asymmetrical haircut. "She's the general manager, so she's the one you need to impress. Follow me."

Sal led the way backstage. Percy practically had to jog to keep up.

"You need to warm up or anything?" Sal asked, heading up the narrow steps to the stage.

"Is that the usual way things are done?" Percy asked.

Sal rolled his eyes. "Oh, listen to him," he said to no one in particular.

They walked out onto the stage.

"That's your mark," Sal said, pointing to a Spell-o-tape X in the center of the stage. "You ever use a microphone before?"

Percy looked at him blankly.

"Do you even know what a microphone is?"

"Is that anything like a tellyphone?"

"Oh, for the love of- Stand on the X. Hold this." Sal shoved a metal cylinder into Percy's hands. "This is a microphone. It makes your voice louder without magic. Don't ask me why we use them. Lana's got this whole 'authenticity' thing. Sing into the round end and don't give me any lip. Got it? Good."

Percy adjusted his grip on the 'microphone' and looked out across the club. A green-skinned man in a white leisure suit walked through the curtained doorway and slid into the booth beside the club manager. A waiter scurried over immediately with a drink.

"Who-What is he?" Percy asked Sal, with a slight nod in the green man's direction.

"Him? Talent scout or something, from L.A. He's helping Lana hire the talent."

"Well, yes. But _what_ is he?"

"A demon, I expect."

Percy swallowed hard. "Do they have those in Los Angeles?"

Sal shrugged. "It would certainly explain Jennifer Love Hewitt." He paused thoughtfully. "Among other things."

"Sal?" Lana said. "Whenever Mr. Weasley is ready to start..."

"Break a leg, kid," Sal said, slapping him a little too roughly on the back and heading to the wings.

Percy took a deep breath, lifted the microphone to his mouth and reminded himself that, really, he didn't have anything to lose.

" _Her name was Lola; she was a showgirl..._ "

It was very hot and bright under the lights; Percy began to sweat. The microphone felt slick in his hand. He sincerely hoped he wouldn't drop it. Not for the first time, he reflected that this had probably been a very bad idea. But, then, so was starving to death and this audition had come to him without any effort on his part. He looked down at the nearest corner booth where the club manager was sitting with the demon talent agent.

The demon was frowning.

"Whoa, whoa." It- He held up a hand. "Hold on there, my little English crumpet."

Percy stuttered to a halt.

"I'm sorry?"

"There's a time and a place for Manilow... But, sweetie, it's just not you. Your aura is all over the place." At Percy's look, he said, "Trust me on this one. What you're feeling right now? I get it." He took a sip from his drink. "You're feeling lost, uncertain, far away from home -- and, believe me, I understand that last one. You've lost your direction; you need to find your path."

The demon smiled at him. Percy just nodded numbly.

"Try something a little closer to home. You know what I mean. Sing from the heart, you won't regret it."

Percy closed his eyes, willed himself not to think, and started to sing the very first thing that came to mind.

" _He kept dreamin' that someday he'd be a star. But he sure found out the hard way, that dreams don't always come true..._ "

Percy wasn't sure what exactly made him pick that particular song. The first time he heard it he'd been very small, playing in his father's workshop behind the house while his father tinkered with a Muggle radio. It just seemed right somehow.

When he finished, the demon beckoned him over.

Percy looked at Sal. "Is this a good thing or a bad thing?"

Sal shrugged, then gave Percy a little push toward the lip of the stage.

"Nice job, Mr. Weasley," Lana said as he approached.

Percy mumbled something vaguely resembling a 'thank you' in response, then realized he'd forgotten to put down the microphone when he finished singing.

"Give us minute, won't you, Lana-love?" The demon smiled brightly.

Lana gave the demon an indulgent smile in return, grinned at Percy, and slid out of the booth.

Somewhat perplexed, Percy sat down.

"That was more like it," the demon said. "Have a drink." He signaled at the bartender, who brought over two cocktails.

Percy accepted the drink a little warily. It had an umbrella in it. "Thank you, Mr.-"

"Just call me Lorne. I'm a one name kind of guy."

"All right. Thank you, Lorne."

Lorne waved off the thanks. "You're talented, mon enfant. I only tell the truth."

"I don't suppose that means I've got the job, then?"

Lorne took a long drink, then looked seriously at Percy. "I won't lie to you. You're fabulous, but I'm gonna tell Lana not to hire you."

"What?" Percy picked up his own drink and took a long gulp. "So what's the problem?"

"No problem. This just isn't right for you."

"You think I wouldn't be able to do it? I know I don't really have any experience-"

"Oh, you could do it all right, and have a bright future at it, too. There's just one problem -- it's not your future."

"Really?" Percy said, annoyed. He'd put himself out there once again, only to be shot down. "I'd love it if someone could tell me just what my future is."

Lorne looked delighted. "Well, sweetie, if that's what you're after, you've come to the right place."

"What?" Percy said, feeling sandbagged.

"That's what I do. I read destinies, and yours is talking to me loud and clear." He leaned in, propping his chin on one manicured, green hand. "Now, granted, I haven't been around in this world long, but pain is pain and yours is howling for everything it's worth. You wouldn't have even had to sing for me to see that." He grinned. "But I'm glad you did. You do Gladys and those Pips justice, let me tell you. It's a shame we can't keep you."

"You read destinies? Like Divination?"

"Not quite. I'm not so much with the tea leaves or the crystal balls." He paused. "When people sing, they let their psychic guard down. Once that door is open, I can read all the possibilities in there. My job is to set people on the right path; just like I'm here to set you back on your path."

"And that is?"

Lorne grinned at him. "Finish your Sea Breeze, kiddo. You're gonna save the world."

*

Ginny was more than a little surprised the next day to receive an invitation to Neville Longbottom's birthday party. She wasn't surprised to be invited; she was surprised Neville was having a party in the first place. She liked Neville quite a lot, but she never would have pegged him for a party sort of person. Then again, she never would have imagined that he'd have been able to hold off a roomful of Death Eaters nearly single-handedly, either.

Ron, Harry and Hermione, predictably, refused to go. The invitation had specifically included all four of them. Ginny, who thought that getting out of that horrible house for an evening sounded better than great, accepted immediately. Then she set to work trying to convince the others to go. She started with Ron, figuring he'd be the easiest sell.

"It will be fun," Ginny said. "Mum won't mind. Neville's gran will be there."

Ron just slouched further down in his chair and mumbled something indistinct, casting a slightly furtive glance in Hermione's direction. So, Ginny tackled Hermione next.

"This is hardly the time to be thinking about a party," Hermione said, frowning vaguely. "I'm rather surprised at Neville."

And, finally, Ginny hiked up to the attic on Thursday afternoon to have a go at Harry. It was raining and Harry was holed up there, surrounded by dusty, old trunks.

"What are you doing up here?" Ginny asked, wrinkling her nose against the dust and cobwebs.

"I'm just going through some things. Cleaning stuff out," Harry said, sliding a book hurriedly under a drop-cloth to keep Ginny from seeing what it was.

"I just thought I'd mention that Neville's party is Saturday," Ginny said. "He'd really like it if we'd all come."

Harry sighed. "Ron and Hermione aren't going, are they?"

"Well, no," Ginny said. "But I am."

"Are you? I didn't think you were." Harry sat up, seeming almost interested. Ginny was surprised. Of the three, she'd thought Harry would be the hardest to convince.

"It seems important to Neville. I thought I should go."

Harry paused. "I probably ought to. I just-" He faltered. "I wouldn't want to ruin it for everyone else."

"Harry…" Ginny knelt down next to him. "I know things are bad. I know you feel awful, like nothing's ever going to be right again. I do understand that. But you can't-"

She never got the chance to finish, though, because the door to the attic creaked open and Professor Lupin poked his head through.

"There you are, Harry," he said. "Do you have a moment to talk?"

"Sure," Harry said. Turning back to Ginny, he said," I know you're trying to help, but I think it's better if I stay here. You should go, though."

"Thanks," Ginny said, a little sourly. "Glad I've got your blessing."

Harry wasn't listening, though. He was already following Lupin back downstairs. Ginny stood up, dusted off her jeans and followed them, too.

*

On Saturday night, Kingsley walked into 12 Grimmauld Place and right into the center of a shouting match.

"I can't believe you don't respect Harry's feelings on this, Ginny," someone was saying loudly from the drawing room.

"Harry said he doesn't want to go. He never said I shouldn't go, and good thing, too." That was Ginny. "It would do him some good, though, to get out of here. Staying locked up all the time isn't good for anyone. We all ought to know that by now."

"Now just what is that supposed to mean?"

The drawing room door flung open and Ginny came storming into the hall. She had a broomstick in one hand and a denim jacket in the other. She whirled back around to face the open door, without seeing Kingsley.

"I’ve told you, Ginny," Ron said from inside the room. He sounded vaguely apologetic. "We aren't going."

"Fine. Wallow." She slammed the door.

"Well, looks like I got here just in time," Kingsley said.

Ginny turned to face him, her dark look disappearing. "Hello, Kingsley."

She turned toward a hallway mirror, digging a tube of lipstick from her jacket pocket. The mirror hissed something poisonous-sounding at her. "Oh, shut up already," Ginny said to it, and began touching up her make-up.

Kingsley walked over and leaned against the wall beside the mirror, folding his arms across his chest. "And just where, exactly, are you going?"

Ginny gave him a look. "A party." She returned to applying her lipstick.

"A party?" Kingsley asked, incredulous.

"Yes. It's Neville Longbottom's birthday." She flung her jacket over one shoulder and tossed her hair, turning back to examine herself in the mirror. "Don't wait up... Dad."

"It sounds like your brother and his friends don't want you to go."

"Well, Hermione doesn't think I should. I don't think Harry cares one way or the other. And who knows what Ron thinks these days. Puberty has made him really weird."

Kingsley grinned. "What else is new?"

Ginny frowned, looking up at him. "The thing is... I know things are bad, but sitting around thinking about how bad they are won't make them not bad. It won't even do anything to make them a little better."

Kingsley felt a sudden swell of pity for her. He'd been just about that age himself during Voldermort's first go-round.

"I know how you feel," he said, dropping a hand to her shoulder. "Just make sure you're careful. Okay?"

"Okay," she grinned.

"Is somebody going with you?"

She nodded. "Dean's meeting me at the end of the lane. We'll be super-careful." She paused. "Thanks, Kingsley. I don't know what I'd do without you," she said, and was out the door before he could respond.

*

Ginny had always had a suspicion that Neville came from money, but his house turned out to be even bigger and more ostentatious than she'd expected. _Longbottom Lane_ was large and Victorian, with neo-gothic gables and lots of stained glass. Iron lanterns lined the drive, casting flickering shadows as they walked. Dean looked up at the house and let out a low whistle.

"Nice," he said. "You think there'll be a butler?"

Ginny grinned, threading her arm through his. "Nah. Probably a lot of house elves, though."

"Those little bastards give me the serious willies."

Ginny laughed, reaching up to pull the doorbell. "Don't let Hermione hear you say that."

"Where is she, anyway? I figured she and Ron and Harry would come, too."

Ginny groaned. " _Such_ a long story..."

"Let me guess," he said. "Harry freaked out again and Ron and Hermione have to be there to hold his hand."

"Maybe not such a long story then."

The door was opened by a very old and very tiny house elf. It ushered them in without a word. Dean made a face, and Ginny stifled a giggle.

"It's not," Dean said, taking Ginny's jacket and moving to hang it up in the hall closet for her, "that I'm blaming Harry. If half the stuff that's happened to him had happened to me, I'd be freaking out, too."

"Half the stuff that's happened to Harry has happened to me," Ginny said grumpily.

Dean looked down at her, surprised.

"Well, maybe not half," she admitted. "More like a fourth, and I was unconscious for a lot of it."

He shook his head, grinning. "Just when I think I get you, you surprise me."

"Well, that's why you like me."

"Among other reasons." Dean grabbed her by the forearm and was about to pull her to him when they were interrupted by Neville.

"Ginny! Dean!" he said, coming down the front hallway. "Nice to, uh, see you." He looked a bit ill at ease. "I suppose I should have been out here to greet you. I'm not very good at this sort of thing. This whole party was my Gran's idea."

"Hi, Neville," Ginny said. "Don't worry about it. We were able to find the coat closet all by ourselves."

"Well, come on in," Neville said, still looking a bit nervous. "There's plenty of food and drinks."

Dean perked up. "Drinks? What sort of drinks?"

"All sorts, I should imagine. Gran is very careful about that sort of thing."

"Well, yes," Dean said. "But are there drinks of the, er, alcoholic persuasion?"

"Oh, yes," Neville said cheerfully. "Plenty. I've had an entire can of lager myself." He stopped, looking thoughtful. "I wonder if I'm supposed to be drunk yet?"

"I think you've still got a ways to go," Ginny said, pushing open the double doors.

The party wasn't exactly swinging, but she had definitely seen worse.

"There you are!" Seamus said, jogging up to them. "I was beginning to think you weren't going to come."

"Your mum actually let you out of the house?" Dean said. Ginny thought he was joking, but there was a little truth in it, too.

Seamus frowned. "Yeah, she did. First time all summer, though."

"You want a drink?" Dean asked, looking longingly at the drinks table.

"I'll get them," Ginny offered. "You haven't seen Seamus all summer, after all. What do you want?"

"Anything but cider," Dean said.

"Anything's fine with me," Seamus said.

As she walked away, Ginny heard Seamus say, "Your girl's all right, mate."

"You just like her because she brings drinks," Dean replied, but looked over his shoulder and shot Ginny a brilliant smile.

"Well, yeah," Seamus said. "A pretty girl who brings me beers? Throw in a good match of Quidditch and I could die and go straight to heaven."

"Hey, my girl _plays_ Quidditch."

"See what I mean, then?"

Ginny shook her head and kept walking across the room.

A girl stood by the drinks table, her back to Ginny, telling a group of listeners, very matter-of-factly, that her summer trip to Sydney had been simply filthy with all manner of fearsome Bunyips. Ginny thought she recognized the voice (and the subject matter), but, of course, it couldn't possibly be...

"Luna?" Ginny gasped.

"Oh, hello," Luna said, turning to face Ginny with a smile and not looking one bit like herself. Her dishwater blonde hair was pulled back neatly, secured with an antique-looking garnet comb, and she was wearing a lovely red dress. Ginny blinked.

"Luna, you look... nice," she said, trying to keep the surprise out of her voice. She mostly succeeded. Mostly. Well, she succeeded a little.

"Do I?" Luna said, oblivious. "I spilled punch all over my sweater earlier. It's too bad, really. It was one of my favorites: nargle wing and cashmere, and the loveliest shade of orange. My father had it imported from Italy. I'll have to show you. But Neville's grandmother was so awfully nice, she gave me this dress to wear, instead."

So that explained it. Ginny's world quietly resumed making sense.

"Well, it looks nice on you. I quite like it."

Neville seemed to think so, too, because he kept casting looks in their direction.

Ginny reached across Luna and fished two beers from a bucketful of ice. She tucked them in the crook of one arm and grabbed two more.

"So you went to Sydney this summer, Luna?"

"Oh, yes," Luna said, looking a bit distracted by the question. "It's winter there now, of course."

"Of course," Ginny said. The chilled cans were starting burn her skin. An ice chip dribbled down her front and under the waistband of her jeans. "Well, I have to take these back over to Dean."

"He's your boyfriend."

"Yup. Well, bye-"

"What about Harry?"

Ginny stopped in mid-turn. "What _about_ Harry?" The words came out a bit more sharply than she'd intended and she regretted it immediately.

"Nothing," Luna said, and wandered off without another word.

Luna hadn't seemed offended, really, Ginny told herself as she walked back to the boys. But, then, with Luna you never knew...

Seamus and Dean were arguing heatedly about Quidditch; Neville was leaning on the back of a chair, half-listening, but looking up every once in a while to watch Luna.

"That's bollocks," Dean was saying, looking very happy. "The Cannons haven't even had a shot since 1986-" He turned to her in appeal. "Right, Gin?"

"Stranger things have happened," she said, tossing them each a can, "but I wouldn't hold my breath."

She popped the top on her own can and took a drink, letting them go back to arguing good-naturedly. She looked over to where Luna had cornered some hapless Hufflepuffs and was no doubt subjecting them to the hibernation cycles of wild Bunyips. Ginny frowned.

"What's the matter?" Neville asked, turning to her.

Ginny shook her head. "Oh, I just- Sometimes I don't know what to do with Luna. I think I might have hurt her feelings just now."

"I doubt it, Ginny. Luna knows she can be a little different. I think her skin is probably pretty thick by now."

"She is odd, but nice – and you seem rather interested in her," Ginny said, handing over the last can of beer.

Neville blushed. "It isn't that. It's just-" He glanced a bit furtively at Dean and Seamus, who weren't paying them the least bit of attention. He leaned in toward Ginny and spoke softly. "It's just nice to see her wear that dress."

Ginny blinked. "Uh, okay. I realize that her usual outfits are pretty ghastly, but-"

"Are they?" Neville said. "I hadn't noticed. It's just that the dress- Well, it was my mother's."

"It was your mother's?" Ginny repeated, aghast. "And your grandmother let her wear it?"

"I don't mind so much," Neville said. "It looks rather nice on her, don't you think?"

"That is entirely beside the point."

"Not really. If I'd minded, Gran would never have offered."

Having met Mrs. Longbottom, Ginny was not entirely convinced of that, but she didn't press the point.

"Well, you've thrown a lovely party anyway, Neville," she said, changing the subject. It really was a nice party. More people had come in since she and Dean arrived and everyone appeared to be having a very good time. That may have had something to do with the rapidly disappearing lager, however.

"I'm glad you could come. I don't suppose-" He trailed off.

"Suppose what?" Ginny asked, taking a drink of her own beer. It wasn't very cold anymore, and getting a little flat. She tipped her head back and took a long swallow. No sense letting it go warm.

"Well… Isn't Harry coming?" Neville asked, looking a bit disappointed.

"No, Neville. I'm sorry. I just don't think he felt up to it."

"Oh, well, I just thought it might be nice since it's practically his birthday, too."

It was. Ginny had forgotten.

"And, I suppose I should have told you but-" He gestured at a table behind him, piled high with gifts. "Some of these are for him."

"Really?" Ginny stepped closer to the table. In the center, a gigantic cake frosted with pearly fondant icing sat atop a small pedestal. Across the front, it read, piped in crimson and gold, "Happy Birthday, Neville and Harry."

"Oh, bloody hell," Ginny said.

"Was this a bad idea?" Neville asked, looking stricken. "I told Gran that Harry might not- But she said that was nonsense and-"

"No. Neville, no. It's a perfectly lovely gesture, and I know Harry will appreciate it. I just wish I'd known. I would have tried harder to get him to come."

"It's all right," he said. "I understand that he must feel awful, after... Well, after everything."

"You don't know the half of it," Ginny muttered. She looked up, putting a hand on his arm. "Look here, Neville. I'll fix this. Just give me a minute. Where's your fireplace?"

"You don't have to-"

"Neville," she said sharply. "Fireplace. Now."

"There's one in the study. And the music room. And the library. And the billiard r-"

Ginny shook her head. "I think it's safe to say that I'll be able to find one, then."

Neville just nodded and pointed at a pair of double doors at the far end of the room.

"Thanks. I'll be right back."

She stepped away from the table, grabbing Dean by the arm as she went. She pulled him a safe distance away from Neville and said, "We have a problem."

"What's the matter?" Dean asked.

"That." She pointed at the cake. "Neville intended this party to be for Harry as well."

He shrugged. "Yeah, I know."

"You knew?" she said. "Why didn't you warn me?"

He shrugged again. "Neville said it was supposed to be a surprise. He said we were supposed to keep it a secret."

"From _Harry_ , not from me."

Dean grinned at her. "Neville said not to tell you, Ron or Hermione. He knows how you guys are about Harry."

"What is that supposed to mean?" she said, pulling away from him.

"Hey, hey," he said, catching her arm. "If the twins had been around, Neville would have said the same thing about them, too. Your whole family is like that about Harry. I think it's nice, that you all care so much. He hasn't got anyone else." He smiled down at her. Ginny began to feel a bit weak in the knees.

"Quit doing that," she said.

He smiled even wider. "Quit doing what?"

"Being so sweet. I was on a roll."

"I know." He leaned down and kissed her quickly.

"All right, then," she said, pushing him away with a laugh. "I've got to go tell Ron. I can't let all Neville's work be for nothing."

Neville hadn't been exaggerating. There were fireplaces in practically every room -- and _Longbottom Lane_ had a lot of rooms. Unfortunately, just at the moment, most of them were occupied by snogging teenagers.

"Honestly!" Ginny said, after the fifth room. "Well, really! ...And now I sound just like Hermione. I've got to find a fireplace."

She got to the music room at the same time as Hannah Abbott and Justin Finch-Fletchley.

"Oh, no you don't," Ginny said. "This room's mine. If you can possibly control your hormones for ten minutes, you can have it after I'm done. But I need to call Ron."

Hannah and Justin looked at her, perplexed. "We were looking for the kitchen. We've run out of kettle crisps. I don't suppose you know where it is?"

Wordlessly, Ginny pointed in the general direction of the kitchens.

Inside the music room, she wasted no time tossing powder into the fire.

"Ron! Damn it, Ron! I know you're there."

Ron looked up from the kitchen table, where he appeared to be making hot chocolate.

"Ginny?"

"And put in extra marshmallows!" Hermione's voice came from somewhere else in the house.

"Oh, very nice," Ginny said. "What a thrilling evening. I suppose you're all going to do word puzzles and play a rousing game of charades? Then a nice cup of Postum and off to bed at a reasonable hour?"

"Shut up about it, will you?" Ron snapped. "What do you want?"

"You have to come to this party."

Ron sighed heavily. "Not all of us can go gallivanting off like you can, Gin. We've got bigger worries than which shoes are on sale at Gladrags."

"Leaving aside for the moment that the three of you are _not_ the only people involved in the whole fight against ultimate evil... Would you mind hearing me out?"

"What do you want from me?" Ron picked up a heavy, blue cup painted with the words "Hermione's Study Mug" and tossed in three extra marshmallows.

"Try, just once, not to be a complete idiot, won't you?"

He made a face. "What is with you lately? Every time you open your mouth it's like you're the Queen Bitch of Bitch-topia."

Ginny ignored him. "You have to come to Neville's party. Right now. And bring Harry."

"Wha-?" he sputtered. "Give me one good reason!"

"Neville's gran had a cake made. For Harry. People brought presents. I think they might even have been planning on jumping up and yelling, 'Surprise!'"

Ron's jaw dropped. "Why didn't Neville say so?"

"It was a surprise, Ron." She made a face. "None of us were supposed to know. Neville thought we'd warn Harry. But now we all know, and it isn't a surprise anymore, but at least Harry can show up for a little while-"

Ron was shaking his head. "It won't work..."

"Oh, of course not!" Ginny snapped. "We wouldn't want any of you to have to actually leave the house at any point this summer. Sitting in the attic, staring moodily at old photos is helping Harry so much, after all-"

"Ginny, if you would just shut up for half a second, you'd know that isn't what I meant."

Ginny stopped short in the middle of taking a deep breath. "Huh?"

"Mum will never let us go. She hasn't let Harry out of her sight since he got here, says he's in a 'delicate frame of mind.' She wouldn't even let him play Quidditch the other day!"

"Is that all? Well, you'll just have to _sneak out_ ," Ginny said, exasperated.

"Don't say that like it's something you do all the time because-" Ron paused. "It's not something you do all the time, is it?"

"No!" Ginny said, annoyed. "But if, for the sake of argument, you did want to get out of the house without being seen, there's a hidden side door east of the pantry."

Ron just shook his head.

"So you're coming then?" Ginny asked.

"Yeah, yeah. We'll come." He turned to go, muttering something under his breath.

"What was that?"

"I said, we wouldn't have told Harry."

"Oh, please. Like you or Hermione could ever keep a secret from him."

Ron's cheeks went inexplicably pink. "A lot you know," he said, belligerently, and disappeared from the room, carrying the three mugs of chocolate.

*

"I don't think this is a very good idea," Hermione said, for what had to be the one hundred and fiftieth time that evening.

Harry stopped in the doorway, his broomstick in one hand. "You don't have to come, you know, but I'm going."

Hermione looked as though she might say something in response, but just then Ron shoved her gently out the door, pulling it shut behind him. "Come on, then. Let's go if we're going."

"All right," Hermione said. "Fine."

"You're sure you're up for this, right, Harry?" Ron asked, without looking at him. He seemed very interested in cleaning a spot from his own broom.

"Yes. I said so, didn't I?" Harry replied shortly, irritated at having this same conversation again. He'd already been through it twice with Hermione before they'd made it through the kitchen.

Ron looked up. "Just making sure."

"I can't just sit around waiting for things to get better. Both Ginny and Professor Lupin said that to me recently." Ron mouthed 'Ginny?' in disbelief, and Harry added, "Well, they each said it in their own unique ways, of course – but they're not wrong."

"But, Harry," Hermione said, finally seeming to find her voice again, "it's okay to be sad. You have good reason to be. You don't have to force yourself into things before you're ready."

"I want to go," Harry said. "It was nice of Neville. I wish I'd known in the first place."

"Hermione," Ron said, in that tone of voice that usually meant he was about to completely lose his patience, "get on."

"What?"

"Get on. The broomstick." He gestured at a spot on the broom in front of him. "Now."

Hermione seemed uncharacteristically flustered by this. "I- Well- You know, perhaps..."

"Hermione, get on or we're leaving you."

She did.

"I don't approve of this," Harry heard her say as Ron kicked off from the ground.

"Well, gee," Ron replied off-handedly. "Why didn't you just say so?"

"You're still twelve, you know that?"

Ron soared up past the eaves, grinning down at Harry, the wind ruffling both his and Hermione's hair as they picked up speed. Harry stood for a moment and watched them from the ground, before climbing on to his broom and following.

*

"Look," Kingsley said, peering suspiciously into his glass, "I know I said we ought to have a drink, but this is ridiculous."

"I think it's quite tasty," Percy said, defensively pulling his glass closer, effectively hiding it behind the cocktail menu.

"It has a pineapple wedge in it," Kingsley pointed out, "and it's electric blue."

Percy put his head in his hands.

Kingsley chuckled. "That's what you get for letting strange demons buy you drinks. I'm just saying."

"Lorne is hardly a stranger. He interviewed me for a job just this week."

"I didn't say he was a stranger, I said he was strange."

"As opposed to all those run-of-the-mill demons, I suppose."

"Some demons are stranger than others." Kingsley shrugged. "You can't deny that."

"Have you met many demons?" Percy asked, interested.

"Only a few. They're pretty rare around here. The States are lousy with them from what I hear." He paused thoughtfully. "And Belgium, for some reason."

Percy sighed and took another drink. It was a bit sweet, true, but not altogether bad. He felt very tired. Come to think of it, he couldn't remember the last time he'd felt properly rested. Before he'd been sacked, surely. Maybe even before that.

"You okay?" Kingsley asked.

"Oh, yes. I suppose." Percy slid off his glasses and began polishing them with a napkin. "I was just trying to remember the last time I had a good night's sleep."

"You and me both." Kingsley leaned back in his chair. "In fact, I think it's been about twenty years."

"Surely not," Percy said.

"Maybe I'm exaggerating a little." He took a drink. "But sometimes it feels like I've been fighting something every day since I turned eleven. You're probably too young to remember what it was like then."

"I don't remember much," Percy admitted. "I seem to remember that Mum wouldn't let us go outside much. And I remember a time when my father was gone for a long time. I hardly recognized him when he came back." Percy felt a flash of long-forgotten guilt. "I think I may even have been a little frightened of him when he finally did come home."

Kingsley nodded. "I was remembering tonight how things were back then – everybody afraid all the time. I was totally convinced that I'd die before I turned twenty-five."

"That didn't happen."

"No, it didn't. I'm practically ancient now." Kingsley took another drink. "But I remember how it feels not to have a future."

"Is that why you bother with us? With Ginny and me?"

Kingsley looked up, an odd expression on his face, but he never got to answer because just then Lorne came up to their table. He was wearing a burgundy suit coat that should have clashed with his skin, but somehow managed not to.

"Well, hello there. How are you boys enjoying those drinks? Just a special little something that I had Manny back there whip up." He tipped an imaginary hat to the bartender who looked as though he didn't quite know what to make of Lorne.

"So, you, uh, own this place?" Kingsley asked, neatly sidestepping Lorne's question about the drinks.

"Oh, no," Lorne said, waving a hand, "I've got my own little club in L.A., and, let me tell you, I'm itching to get back."

Kingsley turned to Percy. "You moving to Los Angeles?"

"No. Why would-?"

"You said that you interviewed for a job."

"Oh, that," Percy said. "I interviewed here, with Lorne and the club manager. I did not, however, get the job."

"Not for any lack of talent," Lorne said, smiling sympathetically. "You sing like a young Harry Connick, Jr., and you're every bit as cute."

Kingsley sat up, looking at Percy like he'd never seen him before. "You _sing_?"

"Like a little angel," Lorne said. "But that's not the beauty part. Percy here is going to save us all from the Big Doom." He slapped Percy on the shoulder. "Isn't that right, kiddo?"

"That's what he says," Percy mumbled, suddenly becoming very interested in the contents of his glass.

"Which doom is that again?" Kingsley asked grumpily. "We've got more than our share lately."

"Wow. You two sure are a pair of Gloomy Gus-es, aren't you? I think another round is in order. How does a Midori Sour sound, boys?"

Kingsley stifled a groan.

"Oh, I know you're probably more an oatmeal stout sort of a fella, but you could use a little pizzazz." Lorne leaned in. "Or maybe just hum a few bars of something for me. It will help, I guarantee."

"No way. There aren't enough girly-drinks in the world to get me that drunk."

"You're a tough one, aren't you? Big, strong hero-type? But you're closed off." Lorne looked long and hard at Kingsley. "That might get you into trouble one of these days, big guy. I'm just saying." He brightened up abruptly. "Well, if you change your mind, you know where the music is."

Kingsley sighed and took a long drink of his Electric Watermelon. "See, this is why I don't hang out in demon bars."

*

Sometime after eleven, someone turned the lights down and the music up. A group of Ravenclaws were sitting on the floor by candlelight, playing a complicated game that involved drinking on cue, accepting dares and possibly removing pieces of clothing. A few couples had migrated to the enormous sofas in the parlor, and even more couples were dancing slowly in the dark. Neville was dancing with Luna, both of them looking a bit awkward and bemused.

Ginny grinned at Neville over Luna's shoulder, then grabbed another drink and wandered into the foyer to look for Dean. It was brighter out here, though only just, and quiet. No one appeared to be around, except Harry, who was sitting on the front stairway by himself and staring at nothing in particular.

Harry was working on his second glass of cider. Ron and Hermione had been hovering all evening, which was thoroughly annoying, but Ginny understood why they felt the need. The last thing she (or they, she guessed) wanted to deal with tonight was a drunk and despondent Harry. Now, though, he was alone. He didn't look depressed exactly, just sort of uncertain. Ginny went over.

"How are you, Harry?" she asked, sitting beside him on the stair.

"I'm enjoying myself," he said, sounding completely surprised by the fact. Perhaps, Ginny reflected, he'd forgotten how. "I mean, I'm not exactly the life of the party but-"

"It's an improvement," Ginny finished for him. "Look, I can't pretend to know how it feels for you to have lost Sirius, but I do understand what it's like to be lied to." She paused, taking a breath. "I know how it feels to be misled and manipulated by someone you really trusted. It isn't fair. I don't know if I've felt ever anything worse than that. But it really does get better."

"I know," Harry said. "The problem is, I'm afraid I won't have the chance to let it."

Harry took another drink.

"But I'm not thinking about that tonight," he said, "and neither should you. We're all right now."

"Yes, we are," Ginny said.

Harry gave her a half-smile and stood up to leave.

Ginny sat there a few moments longer. She was about to get up and keep looking for Dean when she heard someone calling her name.

"What?" Ginny asked, looking up into the shadows above her.

"Yes, that's right, dear. Up here."

Ginny stood, squinting into the half-light as her eyes adjusted.

"Come here, dear," Mrs. Longbottom was beckoning from the landing. Ginny went up and sat beside her, out of sight of the others.

"You're Arthur and Molly's girl," she said. It wasn't a question. "Are you enjoying yourself?"

"Oh, yes. Thank you for having us."

"No need to be polite," Mrs. Longbottom said, but she looked pleased.

"Neville seems to be having a nice birthday. And," Ginny paused significantly, "Luna Lovegood looks quite pretty tonight."

"Oh, yes. That," Mrs. Longbottom said, with a slightly evil grin. "A terrible shame. But I'm getting on, you know, and I'm a bit clumsier than I used to be."

Ginny gaped up at her.

"Of course," Mrs. Longbottom continued, "it will be nearly impossible to get crème de cassis out of that horrible orange sweater. It will have to be thrown out. More's the pity, I suppose."

"You are my new hero," Ginny said, with more than a shade of deference.

"The trick, my dear, is managing people without letting them catch on that they're being managed." She paused. "And if that doesn't work, a swift boot to the arse just might." She offered Ginny a rose-sprigged plate without breaking stride. "Have a chocolate, dear."

Ginny accepted, took a bite and nearly choked on the whiskey filling. "Good Lord."

"Just what the doctor ordered," said Mrs. Longbottom, popping two into her mouth at once. "You seem to have a handle on things, though – especially where the Potter boy is concerned. Don't let him get away with anything, no matter how much your family wants to let him."

"He's had it rather tough recently..." Ginny began.

"All the more reason not to back down."

"Not to be rude," Ginny said, "but I'm not sure that's necessarily the best way of going about it. I mean, just look at Neville-"

"Yes," Mrs. Longbottom said, "just look at Neville. Perhaps I am a bit tough on him, but he was such a delicate little boy. Always bringing home stray pets and orphaned baby birds; would cry at the least little thing. But I knew, Ginny dear, that life was going to be hard for him; that he wanted some toughening up. And I knew I couldn't mind if he hated me for it, not if I wanted to see him survive. Love isn't always hugs and warm milk, dear. Too many people think it is."

"Oh," was all Ginny said in reply.

"You're the same, whether you see it or not. You aren't afraid of a good, sharp kick to the shins if it's warranted. I've seen that."

"You got all that from listening to my one conversation with Harry?" Ginny asked.

Mrs. Longbottom remained suspiciously silent on the subject, merely offering Ginny another chocolate. Ginny made a mental note to ask Harry if he knew whether Dumbledore was spying on them. That was an incredibly disturbing prospect, to say the least.

"Did you know, my dear," Mrs. Longbottom began, deftly changing the subject and unwrapping a chocolate of her own, "that I was on the first voyage of the Queen Mary? They say it was the finest ship ever to sail the Atlantic..."

Ginny listened while Neville's gran told several amusing and mildly scandalous stories from her youth. The plate of whiskey chocolates had gone and Ginny's head felt slightly fuzzy by the time she finished.

At last, Mrs. Longbottom stood, wrapping an elegant, embroidered shawl around her shoulders.

"Well, you young people seem to have the party well in hand. I'm going to nip over to Algie's for a bit. It's canasta night." She straightened the shawl. "If you need me, there's plenty of floo powder by the fireplace in the study. Neville knows where it is. And try to keep the others out of the twelve-year-old scotch, if at all possible."

"Right-o." Ginny grinned, following her down the stairs.

"There's a lovely bottle of my favorite cordial on the sideboard in the music room, though, which you're more than welcome to, Ginny dear."

"Thank you," Ginny said. "It was lovely talking to you. It's the most fun I've had all evening."

"You mustn't be so polite," Mrs. Longbottom chided. "People will take advantage of you."

But as she headed through the door to the study, Ginny thought she looked exceedingly pleased.

*

"False advertising, that's what it is," Kingsley said, pointing accusingly at his half-empty glass. "Nothing pink should be able to get you drunk that fast."

Percy put his glass down and looked up. "I feel strangely fine."

"I wouldn't be too proud of that, were I you."

"But," Percy straightened his glasses, "you aren't me."

Kingsley chuckled. "That's true. I'm much better looking, and handier with the ladies."

"Yes," Percy said dryly. "So I hear."

"Do you?" Kingsley looked delighted. "What are they saying about me now?"

"Just that- Well, it's just that I've heard..."

"Yes?"

Percy shook his head. "I've heard that you aren't terribly particular about the sort of young lady you keep company with."

"Huh?" Kingsley said. Then, after a moment, "Oh, you think I'm some sort of-"

"Casanova?" Percy offered helpfully.

Kingsley looked amused. "That's one way of putting it. But, yeah."

"Well, that is what I hear," Percy said, carefully neutral.

"Well, shouldn't believe everything you hear, Percy. At least half those stories aren't true."

"If even half of them are, that's rather impressive." He straightened up on his stool. "Not, of course, that it's any of my business."

Kingsley shook his head and laughed. "Why do you want to know about this anyway? You worried?"

Percy didn't respond.

Kingsley turned to him and frowned. "Look here. I like Ginny. She's a smart kid, with a lot of spunk – and I'd have to be deaf, dumb, blind and _dead_ not to notice that she's growing into quite a good-looking girl. But, kid, she's fifteen years younger than I am, and I'd never do that to your parents. They've looked out for me since I _was_ Ginny's age." He took a long drink. "Now, if she was a few years older, I might be declaring my intent or asking Arthur for permission to call, or whatever it is you do when you have honorable intentions toward a lady. But, as it is, there's nothing for you to worry about."

"She has a bit of a crush on you."

"Me, several rock musicians and half the boys at Hogwarts, all of which is perfectly normal at her age."

"She seems rather fickle," Percy said. "It concerns me."

"Man, do you have a lot to learn about women. Percy, fifteen year old girls are the definition of fickle. If I were you, I'd be more concerned if she seemed totally set on one boy."

"She was once," Percy said thoughtfully. "Or, at least, we all thought she was."

"Really?"

"Yes. Harry Potter, as a matter of fact. I don't think my parents would have minded at all, either."

Kingsley was frowning. "Kid doesn't seem like her type. Too moody."

"Now _you're_ worried," Percy said.

"I just don't like the idea of Ginny mixed up with the Potter boy."

"Why? Because it's dangerous?"

"What?" Kingsley said, looking up at Percy finally. "Dangerous? Yeah, sure. It would be dangerous."

But somehow Percy suspected that wasn't what really bothered him about the idea. Wisely, though, Percy kept silent on the subject.

"Do you ever wish," he asked instead, "that you could find someone like that, though? That one person that you're totally set on?"

"I think I'm spoiled for marriage," Kingsley said. "I'm set in my bachelor ways."

"You're hardly thirty!"

Kingsley took another drink. "Feels more like fifty some days."

"You keep saying things like that," Percy said. "I don't think you mean it at all."

Kingsley grinned suddenly. "Probably not." After a minute, he said, "Married or not, I don't exactly want for female companionship. Why complicate a good thing?"

"You have someone in mind, then?"

"Oh, yes." He grinned. "The lovely Nymphadora."

"But she works with you!" Percy said, vaguely scandalized.

"Not directly. Besides, right now she won't even have drinks with me."

"Perhaps she's just not interested?"

There was an extended pause. Percy looked up and Kingsley gave him a pointed look.

"Oh, of course she is," Percy muttered. "How silly of me."

Kingsley grinned. "I'm wearing her down."

"How romantic," Percy said dryly.

"The chase is half the fun, kid. Even you ought to know that."

"I'm afraid I haven't done much chasing," Percy replied, folding his hands and resting them on the table.

"You ever wonder why not?"

Percy sighed. "Because when I was in school, I had a perfectly lovely girlfriend. Since then, I've had other priorities."

"All work and no play, Percy," Kingsley said, grinning again. "I'm just saying." He took another drink.

"What happened to your girl, then?"

"My girl?"

"The one from school?"

"Oh, Penny." Percy shrugged. "Nothing really. Nothing dramatic, anyway. We grew apart and decided to end things. It hurt, of course, but-" He shrugged again. "I suppose it should have hurt more, if it had really meant something."

"That's probably true."

They lapsed into silence for a few minutes.

After a minute, Percy said, "Tonks is only a couple years older than Ginny."

"Five," Kingsley said, “and five years makes a lot of difference."

"So once Ginny turns nineteen, I should start worrying?"

"Maybe," Kingsley laughed, then pointed an accusatory finger at Percy. "You're one to talk anyway. I hear you've found yourself an older woman."

"Celia is only twenty-three," Percy replied, feeling curiously defensive, “and we're just friends."

"Oh, man." Kingsley rolled his eyes. "Have you got it bad."

*

The party was starting to break up by the time Ginny came back downstairs. Neville was sitting alone at the grand piano in the music room, a half-empty glass of cider at his elbow. He played absently with the keys, tapping out a soft melody and only looking up when Ginny walked in. She sat down next to him.

"Where have you been, Ginny?" he asked, leaning toward her, his cheeks slightly pink.

"Talking to your gran." Ginny grinned at him. "She showed me her tattoo. It's wicked. A gold snake, all the way around her wrist."

The color drained from Neville's face. "Oh, dear."

"Did you know she was arrested in 1920 for wearing an indecent bathing costume to a public beach?"

Neville stopped playing and put a hand to his head.

"And she almost eloped with a Muggle. Some famous author, drank a lot. I can't remember his name-"

"Please," Neville said. "I don't want to know. I've spent years carefully not knowing."

"All right then" Ginny said, changing the subject. "Do you play?" She patted the top of the piano gently.

"A bit. Gran made me take lessons. I'm not very good, though."

"You always do that," Ginny said.

"What?"

"Act as though you can't do anything. That isn't true and we both know it."

Neville opened his mouth to protest, but was interrupted by a voice from the door.

"Hey, Longbottom? Your gran wasn't fond of that big vase in the foyer, was she?"

"Oh, bloody hell," Neville muttered and ran out to survey the damage.

"Hey, wait!" Ginny called after him. "Have you seen Dean?"

He hadn't. Neither had Lavender Brown, or Ernie MacMillan, or any of the Ravenclaw fourth years.

Ginny sighed and headed back toward the servants' hall, thinking maybe he and Seamus had gone looking for the wine cellar. She really, really hoped not.

"Ginny!" someone called as she walked past the open door to the drawing room.

She stopped and looked inside. Dean and Seamus were draped over a matched set of wing chairs, a bottle of champagne and empty cake plates on the table between them.

"There you are," Ginny said. "I've been looking for you."

"I'm thoroughly pissed," Dean said, with a sloppy grin. "I hope I don't make an ass out of myself in front of you."

Ginny laughed, walking over and leaning in to kiss him briefly. He tasted like scotch whiskey.

"What have you been drinking tonight?"

"Oh, a little of this, a little of that." He grinned. "You taste like chocolate."

She grinned. "Neville's gran has been getting me tipsy on whiskey chocolates."

"Really?"

"Oh, yes. She's a bit of a character."

Seamus sat up, taking a swig from a half-empty bottle of champagne. "Wish my grandmum were a bit more of that type of character. Whenever we go to visit her, we wind up spending half the time in church."

"Neville's gran doesn't strike me as particularly pious," Ginny said. "She even left me some cordial in the music room -- as if I haven't had enough to drink tonight."

Seamus' eyes lit up. "Oh, where is it? I'll fetch it for us." He stood up, handing the champagne to Dean.

"It's on the sideboard."

"I'll be right back," Seamus said, heading toward the door with a grin.

And then the lights went out.

"What's going on?" Ginny asked, standing up.

Dean grabbed hold of her wrist. "Probably just a power outage. Happens all the time."

"Dean, there isn't any electricity here. All the lights are powered by magic."

"Oh," he said. Then he sat up straight. "Oh! That's bad isn't it?"

"Yes, that could be bad."

She pulled him to his feet and started for the door.

"Where are you going?" he called after her.

"To find Harry." She pulled the door open. "If there's trouble, Harry's bound to be in the middle of it."

Completely predictably, he was.

Seamus stopped short at the door to the parlor, and Ginny and Dean crashed into him from behind.

"Oh, fucking hell," he said softly. When he turned to them, he'd gone white beneath his freckles.

"What is it?" Ginny hissed, standing on tiptoe to get a better look.

She needn't have bothered. She could have guessed without looking: Death Eaters, lots of them, as per usual.

"Oh, not again," she said. "Don't these idiots ever have a different plan?"

"So those are actual Death Eaters, are they?" Dean said, drawing his wand.

"What are you doing?" Ginny grabbed both boys by the arm and dragged them back toward the drawing room. "We have got to go for help."

"But shouldn't we, you know? Fight them?" Dean gestured with his wand.

" _No._ Not unless you want to get killed and take half of Hogwarts with you."

Dean frowned, tugging his arm away. "Harry would fight them."

Ginny snorted. "Harry is also a complete idiot about seventy percent of the time. We have to get out of here. Maybe we can make it out to call for help."

Seamus looked skeptical. "You think we'll be able to just walk out the front door?"

"It's worth a try."

They almost made it. Almost. The Death Eaters were stupid, sure. Unimaginative, even. But they'd still remembered to set a guard. They might still have been able to get out – there was only one Death Eater watching the front door – if they hadn't been taken by surprise from behind.

"Now just where do you think you're going?" one of the Death Eaters asked, catching Ginny by the collar of her jacket. Another leveled his wand at Dean and Seamus, who both put up their hands.

They were hauled unceremoniously into the parlor, where it appeared the Death Eaters had gathered everyone else.

"Come on now. The party's in here," said the tallest Death Eater, who appeared to be in charge. The others laughed as though he'd made a particularly good joke. Judging by their voices, they weren't all that much older than most of the kids at the party.

Harry stepped forward, looking resolved. "If you're here for me, then take me and let the others go."

The tall Death Eater cocked his head at Harry. After a minute, he said, "Who are you?"

"I'm Harry Potter!" Harry said, sounding slightly affronted.

"Oh! Well, that's a bonus, isn't it? We aren't here for you, though. We came for him." He pointed his wand at the space just behind Harry's right shoulder. At Neville.

"There's a lady who'd like a word with you, little Longbottom. Says you have some unfinished business."

"Oh, really?" Neville said, stepping up beside Harry. He was trembling, but once Ginny got a look at his face she realized it was with anger, not fear. "I think I'll have to disappoint her. You can give her a message for me, though. I'll see her in hell for what she did to my parents. That's a promise."

Ginny's jaw dropped, and she found herself gaping stupidly at him. Everyone else in the room was doing the same.

"Neville," Harry said, trying to push him back. "Shut up, won't you? Let me handle this."

"You heard them, Harry," Neville replied. "They aren't here for you."

"Are you trying to get us killed?" Harry asked, annoyed, appearing to forget momentarily that they were surrounded by bad guys.

"Nobody needs to get killed," said the leader, sounding vaguely irritated at being ignored. "Longbottom comes with us; you all get to go home to your mummies and daddies. Sound fair?"

Harry looked around as though daring anyone to agree. Predictably no one did. Well, no one except Neville.

"Sounds fine," he said, stepping forward.

Two Death Eaters moved toward him, but before they could reach him, Neville had his wand out. Harry dived for it, trying to knock it away and pull out his own wand at the same time, but Neville was simply too quick for him. Before Ginny even had time to process that rather surprising fact, there was a large boom, and she was nearly knocked to the ground.

Everyone scattered. Ginny lost sight of Harry and Neville in the crush, but she saw Ron pull Hermione into the far corridor after him, narrowly escaping a volley of spells.

"This way," Dean said, grabbing her hand. They ducked as a large and probably priceless vase shattered into lethal slivers behind them.

*

For quite possibly the first time ever, Harry found himself running away from danger.

It wasn't going particularly well.

"Get off me!" Neville said fiercely, kicking Harry firmly in the shin.

Harry just tightened his grip on Neville's arm. "Are you crazy? I mean, really completely batshit round the bend?"

"I said, get off!"

"If you go back in there, they will really, really kill you. Poof, Avada kedavra, gone. You get it?"

Neville jerked his arm away. "I can't believe you're just going to run away," he said looking very flushed.

"Look," Harry said, breathing heavily. "Maybe you want to play suicidal buddy cops, but I don't!"

"You're trying to tell me that you don't want revenge? For what You-Know-Who and his Death Eaters did to your parents? For what they did to your godfather?"

"How do you know about that?" Harry said sharply.

"Dumbledore said so."

"Well, it's nice to see that Dumbledore is keeping someone informed."

"Actually, he didn't tell me. He told my Gran, and I was listening at the door. Besides, it was obvious that you knew him and it was obvious that he was on our side."

"Oh," was all Harry could find to say in return.

"I'm not sitting still anymore, Harry. Not while the woman who-" He shook his head violently. "I've got to do something."

"Look, you think I don't get that it's a suck-fest being us?" Harry said. "I do. More than you know, _way_ more. But we can't run around just inviting the bad guys to kill us."

"Maybe _you_ can't," Neville replied. "But how much would it matter if I did?"

"A lot. Like I said, more than you know," Harry said, thinking of the prophecy. It still could be Neville. He'd been thinking about that possibility a lot all summer, regardless of what Dumbledore might think. Dumbledore could be wrong; he'd seen that all too clearly. "Trust me on this. We've got to play this smart."

Neville seemed to sag forward. "All right. All right, Harry."

He put a hand on Neville's shoulder. "I knew you'd understand."

Which was, of course, when Neville sucker-punched him.

*

Ginny slammed the study door hard on a Death Eater's hand. He howled in pain, and she slid the bolt home, bracing herself against the door. Seamus and Dean flung themselves against the door as well. It shuddered with the impact as at least one Death Eater tried to break it down. A knot of Ravenclaws huddled in the far corner by the fireplace; one of them whimpered.

After a minute, the door stopped shaking. But Ginny wasn't naïve enough to think that meant the Death Eaters were gone. At best, it meant they'd gone for reinforcements.

"We've got things under control here, guys," Seamus snapped, relaxing away from the door slightly. "Thanks anyway, though."

"Shit," Dean said, wedging a chair under the doorknob for good measure. "We are in seriously deep here." He walked over to the fireplace. "Quick. What's the wizarding equivalent of dialing 999?" He looked around the room, then back to Ginny. "How do you people call for help?"

"Um, we yell 'help'?" Ginny offered.

"Bloody hell, people!" Several of the Ravenclaws flinched. "No wonder you got slaughtered the first time round."

"Dean." Ginny put a hand on his arm. "We can handle this." She reached up on the mantle and grabbed an ornate Faberge egg full of floo powder. "Neville's gran is just next door. She said to use this if there was an emergency."

"We can't just leave the others!" one of the Ravenclaws piped up.

"Don't be an idiot," Ginny snapped. "We aren't going to. We're going to get help." She turned to the fireplace and threw in some powder. "Uncle Algie's," she said clearly, and stepped into the flames. "Come on then. All of you follow me."

The last thing she saw was Dean and the others following suit, before she stumbled out of the fireplace, falling hard onto the sooty hearth. Ginny scrambled to her feet and sprinted for the kitchen door, not bothering to wait to see if the others got through.

"Mrs. Longbottom? Mrs. Longbottom?!" She ran headlong down a corridor, listening for any sound of voices.

At the end of the long hallway, she heard them. Ginny flung open the door and barged into a large dining room. A group of distinguished-looking older people sat round a long, polished table holding cards. An empty decanter of brandy stood on the sideboard.

She skidded to a halt in front of the table. An ancient house-elf stepped bravely into her path and squeaked that Mister Longbottom was not receiving visitors. Ginny shoved him out of the way with one foot and reached out a hand to Neville's gran.

"What's happened, dear?" Mrs. Longbottom asked, taking Ginny's hand in hers.

"They're here. They've come for Neville."

Mrs. Longbottom was immediately on her feet. "Who has?"

"Death Eaters. Lots of them."

"Oh, dear," said an elderly, round-faced man who had to be Neville's Uncle Algie.

"I told you, Adelaide-" he began.

Neville's gran silenced him with a look. "Algie, fetch your valet. He still has one of those -- what are they called? Revolvers? They certainly won't be expecting that. Miriam, fetch the wands." A frail-looking woman with white hair sprung up with surprising agility and opened a Chinese cabinet at the end of the room. "Edward, dear, do call for the Aurors, won't you?" A man with a steel-grey handlebar mustache nodded and exited the room. "The rest of us will hold the villains off until they get here."

"You're going to _hold them off_?" Ginny asked, incredulous.

"Remind me sometime, dear, to tell you about my time in Paris during the second Muggle war." Mrs. Longbottom patted her on the arm and continued to go about issuing orders like a lieutenant on the battlefield.

"Here are some more of the young people," Miriam said from the doorway. Seamus, Dean and the Ravenclaws joined them in the dining room.

"And fetch brandy and blankets!" Mrs. Longbottom called out. She turned to the students. "Sit!"

They all tumbled over one another in their haste to find seats at the table. Seamus even folded his hands politely.

"I'm going with you!" Ginny said, realizing that she still had hold of Mrs. Longbottom's hand.

"Not now, dear. You sit with the others."

"But-" Ginny found herself at a loss for words. "You can't go- You'll be-"

"Now, now." She brushed a hand across Ginny's nose. "You've got soot on your face, dear. Clean yourself up and take care of the others. That's what I need you to do. Do you understand?"

Silently, Ginny nodded.

"Good girl," Mrs. Longbottom said, and they were gone.

*

Percy was feeling a bit woozy when the owl came. Not drunk-woozy, just a little sugar-shocked from the amount of triple sec he'd consumed over the course of the evening. The owl, though, looked as though it might have been drinking. It wove unsteadily toward them, tipping slightly to the right, then the left. Finally, it landed on their table, tripping over one of its claws as it went.

"Hey," Percy said, poking Kingsley in the shoulder. "I think you have an owl."

"I've got a what?"

"Owl. An owl. Someone has sent you something by owl post."

Kingsley looked up from his Peach Bellini. "Oh, so they have."

"Aren't you going to read it?"

"Sure." Kingsley unfolded the parchment with just the slightest noticeable difficulty.

The owl -- which was, Percy noticed, not too much larger than Ron's little Pigwidgeon -- lurched over to Percy's side of the table and dipped its beak in his unattended Brandy Alexander.

"Stop that," Percy said, shooing it away with one hand.

The owl looked up reproachfully. It opened its beak and made an odd noise that Percy would have sworn was a hiccup. He hadn't even realized owls could hiccup.

"Our owl is drunk," Percy said, bemused. "I think, in fact, that our owl may be a drunk. I didn't even know that was possible."

Kingsley wasn't listening, though.

"Damn it," he said, tossing the paper into the tiny oil lamp in the center of the table. "Come on. There's been an incident."

"What?"

Kingsley was already on his feet. "I've got to go. Are you coming or not?"

Percy jumped up, tossing a handful of coins on the table, and followed. The owl took flight with a flutter of wings and settled on Percy's shoulder. It hooted contentedly, having finished the last of both Percy's drink and Kingsley's slightly warm and half-finished Cosmopolitan.

"Don't you have somewhere to go?" Percy asked. It responded by digging its tiny claws into Percy's shoulder and hooting loudly in his ear.

"Where's the fire, fellas?" Lorne asked from behind the bar as they hurried by.

"Duty calls, I'm afraid," Percy said, quickening his step to keep up with Kingsley.

"Well, remember what I said!" Lorne called after him. "That opportunity is gonna come a-knockin' any day now."

*

"You hit me," Harry said in disbelief, putting a hand to his eye. "You hit me, and it hurt."

Neville shrugged. "You would've done the same."

"I would not!"

But Neville was already running back toward the house. Harry took off after him. Neville may have improved in a lot of ways in the last year, but Harry was still faster. He was on Neville's heels within a few seconds and leapt across the remainder of the distance between them, tackling Neville hard. They fell to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs. Neville let out a pained "oof." Harry scrambled up first, pinning Neville's shoulders to the ground.

"We have to get out of here," he said, leaning over the other boy. "We have to go and get help. For once, I'm going to do the smart, sensible, tragedy-averting thing -- and you are coming with me, whether you like it or not."

Neville looked up at him. The expression on his face was one that Harry had a worrying suspicion that he himself had worn in the past.

"You don't get it, Harry," he said. "I'm not afraid anymore."

"Well, maybe you should be." Harry stood, extending a hand to Neville and pulling him to his feet. “What good is it going to do anyone if you get yourself killed?"

"What else have I got to offer? I'm total rubbish at everything else."

"That is quite possibly the stupidest thing I've ever heard anyone say. You are not going to throw your life away on a bunch of second-rate Death Eaters."

"Oh, really?" said a voice from behind them. "I wouldn't be so sure about that."

"Well," Harry said, turning around slowly and not missing a beat. "I suppose you're right. You are pretty second-rate."

There were an awful lot of them standing there, and Harry was trying very hard not to panic. Second-rate or not, they had the advantage of numbers. Between the Death Eaters and whatever suicidally insane thing Neville might attempt next, Harry wasn't having a very good time of it coming up with a plan. The Death Eaters outnumbered them four to one. Even if they managed to take out two apiece, they were still done for -- they'd be killed, or worse. What he needed was surprise, a way to stop all of the Death Eaters at once. If he was right, and they were after the "or worse" rather than killing the two of them outright, he might just have a chance.

"Are you boys going to come quietly? Or shall we do this the fun way?" The leader of the Death Eaters grinned behind his mask. "Fun for us, anyway."

Harry sighed heavily, putting on a show of annoyance. "Do they teach those lame quips in Death Eater training? Or are all of you really just that unoriginal?"

He scanned the scene, buying time. The Death Eaters, he noticed, were standing beneath an archway that supported an old, sagging second-story veranda. If it were to fall, they'd all be caught underneath. Assuming, of course, he could figure out some way to make it fall.

He could do this, he told himself. He could, if for no other reason than to live another day and prove Neville wrong. After all, he'd faced down Lord Voldemort himself. He'd beaten giant brains and man-eating spiders and Hungarian Horntails... The Hungarian Horntail, which he'd defeated by summoning his Firebolt -- which was, at this very moment, leaning up against the front door. Harry looked up again, judging the distance between the veranda's supports. If he got enough speed behind it, it could work. His old broom had managed to put a dent in the Whomping Willow after all.

Harry pulled his wand from his back pocket, "Accio Firebolt!" He swished the wand wildly, hoping to over-cast the spell the way he'd done back when he'd first been learning it.

The Death Eaters stepped forward, wands at the ready, looking bemused.

"Stand down," the leader said. "We want them alive, if possible."

Then, just as Harry had hoped, the broom came zooming wildly around the corner like a missile. It careened into the first support, sending stone chips and bristles flying; then it crashed into the other. One buttress cracked under the assault, but the other appeared undamaged. The Firebolt, though, splintered into matchsticks on impact.

The leader laughed. "Nice try, but I'm afraid that didn't accomplish much."

Harry's heart was beating quickly, adrenaline making him clumsy. "I don't know about that," he heard himself say and nearly tripped over his own feet as he took a step backward.

There was a loud crack and the last support splintered, bringing the archway down on top of the Death Eaters. Harry grabbed hold of Neville's sleeve and hauled him out of harm's way. The two boys sat down hard on the lawn, breathing heavily. Harry still had hold of Neville's sleeve and found he wasn't quite ready to let go. In the distance he could hear the voices of arriving Aurors -- just in time to be absolutely no help, as usual.

*

The action was largely over by the time they got there. Percy picked his way over the Longbottom's scorched drive, dodging Aurors, emergency healers and, oddly enough, a group of senior citizens brandishing weaponry that would have looked more at home during the Boxer Rebellion. The little owl was still riding on his shoulder, and showed no signs of wanting to leave. Its name, according to the official Owl Post tag around its neck, was Bailey -- like the Irish Cream. For, Percy assumed, obvious reasons.

It hiccuped again and nipped Percy on the ear.

"Anybody hurt?" Kingsley asked an emergency healer.

The healer shook her head. "Just a few Death Eaters. Most of the kids got out of the house before any real fighting started. The ones who were left put up a pretty good fight. I mean, these were pretty crappy Death Eaters -- strictly the B-squad -- but still."

Percy stopped listening, craning his head above the chaos for any glimpse of his sister. Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom sat on the wide front steps of the house, blankets draped around their shoulders. Neither looked hurt, but Harry appeared distinctly upset about something. Neville kept looking sidelong at him, as though he wanted to say something but couldn't.

"Come on," Kingsley said. "They need people to search the house."

"Don't they have Aurors for that sort of thing?" Percy asked.

"We're short-handed, so I'm deputizing you." There was a slight pause. "Lose the owl."

Bailey gave a forlorn little mew, and Percy slid him surreptitiously into his jacket pocket. They headed up toward the house, dodging determined-looking Aurors herding prisoners and taking statements from blanket-draped students.

"Telephones," Dean Thomas was saying to one of the Aurors as they walked by. "Look into them, I'm serious."

"Hey, you." Kingsley beckoned a group of junior Aurors over to them. "We're making sure the house is clear. Come on."

"Who is this guy?" one asked, pointing at Percy.

"He's a, uh... special consultant," Kingsley said, not very convincingly.

"You're a Weasley," said a girl, who Percy recognized after a moment as Nymphadora Tonks. She blinked. "You're the Weasley, aren't you?"

Kingsley spared him from having to answer by ordering them all into the house. Percy would far rather have faced down a house full of desperate Death Eaters than answer that particular question.

Luckily, he didn't have to do either. The house was already clear. They didn't find anyone until they reached the massive kitchen. Kingsley eased open the door, motioning for the others to follow carefully. The Aurors fanned out, checking each cupboard and corner quickly and professionally. Percy followed, feeling somewhat awkward and trying to tread silently.

Suddenly, there was a crash from the pantry and a muffled voice hissed, "There's somebody out there. They'll _hear_ you."

The Aurors immediately pulled their wands and lined up along either side of the pantry door. Percy followed suit.

"We know you're in there," Kingsley said, his voice low and commanding. "Come out slowly, and put your wands down. We promise not to hurt you."

"Oh, like we believe that!" said someone from inside the pantry. Followed by, "Ow! What did you have to hit me for?"

There was a long minute of ominous silence while Percy and the Aurors waited, tensed and wands at the ready. Then, abruptly, the door was flung open and a pair of figures jumped forward, yelling "Expelliarmus!" at the top of their lungs.

Percy nearly lost his grip on his wand, not so much because of the spell, but from shock when he recognized one of the figures.

"Ron? What are you doing in that pantry?"

His brother, looking rather worse for wear, spun round with one arm outstretched, effectively shielding his companion.

"Percy?" he said, looking utterly confused. "You're _evil_? When did that happen?"

"I am not evil," Percy snapped.

"But there were Death Eaters, and we were trapped-" Ron gestured expressively with his wand and the Aurors all tensed for action.

"Wands down," Kingsley said to Ron, sounding put out. "Which part of that didn't you understand?"

Hermione Granger peeked out from behind Ron, dropping her own wand. "They aren't evil, Ron. They're Aurors."

Ron finally put his wand down on the kitchen floor. "So they are. I guess we're saved then. Where's Harry?"

"He's fine." Kingsley picked up Ron and Hermione's wands, and the other Aurors pocketed their own. "Everyone is fine. The two of you nearly weren't, though. What were you thinking?"

"That you were Death Eaters, _obviously_ ," Hermione said in a tone of voice that made it perfectly clear that any idiot could have seen that.

Kingsley merely raised an eyebrow and, after checking them over thoroughly, gave them back their wands.

"What is he doing here, then?" Ron asked, pointing his wand accusingly at Percy.

"Helping," Kingsley said, "which is what you should be doing if you're going to insist on putting yourself in harm's way. We're checking the wine cellar. Now get behind me and shut up."

The wine cellar was empty, though, and they made their way back out onto the front lawn. Once Ron and Hermione had been seen to -- and given blankets and brandy, which seemed to be the only emergency medicine available in the wizarding world -- Percy began looking around again for Ginny. They said that no students had been hurt, of course, but no one had mentioned seeing her either. Percy was on the verge of asking Harry Potter, though unsure how Harry might react to him, when he finally saw her. She was wandering up the drive, looking slightly dazed.

"Ginny!" Percy said, forgetting himself for a moment as he ran over to her. She was covered in soot; there were smudges under her eyes and across her cheeks. Her hair was slightly singed at the ends.

Percy caught her by the arm. "Are you all right? They said no one was hurt..."

"I'm fine, Percy." She gave him a slightly lopsided smile. "I just had a little disagreement with some floo powder."

"The way I hear it," Kingsley said, coming up to stand beside them, "you helped save the day."

Ginny laughed sharply. "Yeah, by running away."

"Running for help, you mean. That was smart of you."

"Harry saved us," she said. "But then what else is new? And Neville helped, which is also becoming the usual. Who would've thought?"

"Come on," Kingsley said, draping an arm across her shoulders. "Let's get you home."

They walked back up to the house. Ron and Hermione had joined Neville and Harry on the steps. They all looked incredibly glum.

"What is it?" Ginny asked. "Everyone's all right, aren't they?"

"Well, yeah-" Ron began.

Harry interrupted. "My broom was destroyed." Percy blinked. Harry looked far too upset for this to be about just a broom. He continued, "Sirius gave it to me. He…"

Hermione looked up sharply at Percy, and shook her head at Ron, who reached over and shook Harry's shoulder in warning. Harry didn't seem to notice.

"Oh, Harry," Ginny said softly, kneeling down beside Harry, the look on her face so stricken that Percy had to turn away.

Kingsley took Percy by the arm. "Let's leave them alone for a little bit. I'll have someone make sure they get home safely."

It wasn't until he was home that night, freshly showered and lying in bed too keyed up to sleep, that it occurred to Percy to wonder whether Harry had been talking about Sirius Black. And, if so, what on earth did it mean?

*

Tonks accompanied them all back to Grimmauld Place. Ginny had hoped Kingsley would come with them, though she wasn't really sure why, but he stayed with Percy instead. She tried not to be too put out by that. Dean had wanted to come with her, but she couldn't very well allow him to come to the Order of the Phoenix's secret headquarters. So, instead, she told him he ought to go with Seamus, who was having a very difficult time explaining to his mother that, no, Death Eaters did not usually attack parties thrown by Hogwarts students.

"I am never going to be allowed out again," he'd said miserably. Dean clapped him on the shoulder, gave Ginny a kiss and flooed off with Seamus to face the music.

Now, an hour or so later, Ginny was sitting in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, drinking tea and waiting for her mother to start yelling.

So far that hadn't happened. It had to be some sort of record.

"So, you're not mad?" Ron asked hopefully, taking a sip of his own tea.

"I am not happy that you went out without telling anyone where you were going," their mother said, showing practically superhuman restraint. "I am, however, glad that you are all safe."

Ron and Hermione exchanged perplexed looks. Harry just sat miserably in the corner, looking inconsolable.

Ginny shrugged. "Hey, I had permission to go."

"Yes, you did, dear," her mother said. "I'm very proud of you. Nymphadora tells me that you behaved very responsibly."

Ron made a face at her, but Ginny just smiled serenely.

"I think you all need to go on up to bed." They all got up to leave. "Oh, Ron? Why don't you stay here a moment."

Now the yelling would start. Ginny, Harry and Hermione exited the kitchen as quickly as possible. While she felt sorry for Ron, Ginny couldn't help being pleased that her mother had shown some sort of restraint in front of the others. Perhaps this was a sign of things to come.

"What on earth were you thinking? Taking Harry out to a party with alcohol and who knows what else?" her mother's voice came from the kitchen.

Then again, perhaps not.

Professor Lupin was waiting for them at the top of the stairs. "Could I have a word, Harry?"

"No."

If Lupin was shocked, he didn't show it.

"Nonetheless, Harry, I think we should talk."

"So talk," Harry said belligerently. "Anything you have to say, you can say in front of Hermione and Ginny, can't you?"

"Yes, I suppose I can." Lupin paused. "I thought you might want to talk about your Firebolt."

"Well, guess what? I don't!" He crossed his arms. "I can't even leave the house without Death Eaters attacking, and the broom is destroyed and it's all just to be expected after the way my life has gone lately. Sirius gave it to me and it was all I had left. So let's all cry about it, why don't we?"

Ginny took a step back from Harry and saw, out of the corner of her eye, that Hermione had done the same.

"It isn't the only thing," Lupin said quietly. "I wasn't going to tell you right away. It isn't yours until you turn seventeen anyway, but-"Harry just looked coldly at Lupin.

"I don't know if this will make you feel better or worse, but you ought to know." He paused. "I'm trying, Harry, to be straight with you from now on. I'm trying to make sure you have all the facts. I hope you know that."

"All right then," Harry said impatiently.

"Sirius left you almost everything he still had. Including this house."

"The house?"

"You're Sirius' godson, his heir. Technically, that makes you the last member of the Black family."

Ginny was appalled. She couldn't imagine that Harry would want that horrible house.

"When you're of age, it will all be yours. Not just what Sirius left you, but everything that was left by your parents and grandparents as well."

Now, Harry looked confused rather than angry. "But I've already gotten the money my parents left."

Lupin frowned. "That's only a trust. Eventually, you'll receive your full inheritance from the Potters. There's still a house somewhere, if I remember correctly. Though it isn't the one James grew up in..."

"Why didn't anyone tell me this before?" Harry cut in hotly.

"Someone should have," Lupin said mildly. "Who set you up at Gringotts?"

"Hagrid."

"Ah," was all Lupin said in reply. "You ought to go on to bed, Harry. If there's anything else you want to know, please ask me. I will tell you if it's in my power to do so."

Harry just nodded and turned to walk away.

"I _am_ trying, Harry," Lupin said, sounding very tired. "I want you to know that. I want you to feel as though someone has learned from our mistakes."

"Yeah, thanks," Harry said gruffly, but without turning around. Some of the tension around Lupin's eyes eased at the words, though.

Harry went into his and Ron's room, and Ginny and Hermione followed. Harry sat on his bed, not looking at them, while Hermione tidied up Ron's dresser. Ginny picked Crookshanks up from the floor and draped him across her shoulders.

Ron was in a foul temper when he finally came back to the room. "That is the last time I ever listen to anything you have to say!" He pointed an accusatory finger at Ginny.

"Hey, nobody forced you to come out. I only told you what Neville had planned. The decision was yours."

Ron ignored her. "Of course Mum said it was all my fault, without the twins to blame for every damn thing that goes wrong..." He was building up a fine head of steam. "And what was Percy doing there? Why were you being so friendly with him?"

Ginny said nothing.

"Have you been in contact with him? Ginny, what are you thinking? Mum will have kittens!"

"Ron, no matter what else he's done, he's still our brother. I couldn't just-"

"I can't believe this." He flung himself onto the bed.

"Now, Ron-" Hermione began.

"Don't you go defending him, too, Hermione."

Hermione opened her mouth to retort, but was cut off.

"It's the thirty-first," Harry said just then, apropos of nothing.

The others abruptly stopped bickering and turned to look at him.

"What's that, Harry?" Hermione asked.

"It's past midnight. It's the thirty-first, my birthday."

"Oh." Ginny sat down on the bed beside him.

"Not that it matters," Harry continued. "It's only that I'd forgotten until just now."

"Happy birthday, Harry," Ginny said softly. "And I'm sorry about- you know." She dropped a hand briefly to his shoulder.

"Thanks."

"I'm going to bed," she said to the others, and was out the door before Ron could say another word.


	4. The Long Way Back

As the month of August dawned (bringing with it Day #37 of Percy's Unemployment and General Uselessness -- not, of course, that he had been keeping track), Percy had to concede that he was roughly zero for four with regard to employment prospects. He was not, it would appear, cut out to sell wands or sing torch songs. His stint as a Ministry personal assistant had been, needless to say, short and disastrous.

Nor, apparently, was he fitted to the position of a chartered accountant.

Looking around the offices of Giles, Gil and Trout Accountancy Ltd. Percy forced himself to pay attention to what his interviewer -- one Mr. Gil -- was saying.

"Can I have Jill get you some tea?"

"Oh, no thank you," Percy said, smiling politely at the rather ordinary-looking secretary hovering by the door.

The entire office was beige and bland, without so much as one piece of art on the walls. There were no windows. Even the accountants themselves seemed beige: their robes, their smiles, their voices were all bland and vaguely khaki-toned.

Gil sat down, folding his hands atop his balsa and parchment blotter. "Do you have any experience in accountancy, Mr. Weasley?"

"Well, no," Percy managed. "Not as such."

"I see. Hmm." Gil rearranged some papers on his desk, peering at them through his spectacles. "And yet Waggley, Nystram and Nystram seemed to think you fit for the position... Their opinion is not inconsiderable, to say the least." He took a long drink of coffee from a cream-colored porcelain mug emblazoned with the firm's tan logo. "I must confess, though: you're a bit on the animated side, Mr. Weasley. Compared to most of our staff... Well, thrill-seekers such as yourself often find accountancy a difficult transition to make."

Percy just stared at him, trying to decide whether it would be wildly inappropriate to begin laughing. _Thrill-seeker_?

"Well," Percy said, feigning a coughing fit in an attempt to recover himself, "I suppose I have to concede the point. Perhaps -- Waggley, Nystram and Nystram aside, of course -- it's not a particularly good fit for me."

He stood, and Gil followed suit.

"Thank you very much for the opportunity to come in and discuss the position with you, though." Percy extended a hand, and the two shook.

"I'll just have Jill show you out."

On the way back to the lobby, Percy walked past row after row of tweedy, beige cubicles. One of the cubicles' occupants knocked a paperclip to the floor. The impact echoed loudly in the complete silence of the office.

"Do you like working here?" Percy asked Jill the secretary, for want of anything else to say.

One side of her mouth quirked up just slightly, the first sign of animation he'd seen from anyone in the place all morning.

"What do you think, Mr. Weasley? Just be thankful you dodged this particular bullet." She opened the door for him, letting the morning sun stream into the florescent lighting and recycled air.

When he got home he was going to burn his career assessment and dance atop the ashes of the parchment.

*

Bailey the borderline alcoholic owl had taken up residence in Percy's flat. When Percy tried to return him to the owl post office, the postmistress had laughed for a full five minutes and refused to take him back.

"Always drunk, that one," she said, leveling an accusatory finger at his tiny beak. "Not worth the price of his feed. You keep him."

Not knowing quite what else to do, Percy had taken Bailey home with him. Hermes, needless to say, loathed the little owl on sight.

The two owls were staring at one another with uncomfortable intensity across Percy's kitchen table when he returned to his flat.

"None of that now," he said mildly, separating the two with a gentle but firm hand and pulling a packet of owl treats down from the cupboard. Both owls crowded in close to him as he sat, jostling slightly with their wings. Percy sighed and gave each a carefully equal portion of the treats.

"Of course," he said aloud, "if I don't find a new situation soon, I won't be able to afford to feed two owls – or myself."

Bailey's little head popped up abruptly and the owl hooted softly. Hermes looked up with an expression of cool concern.

"I'm just saying." Percy shrugged. "You two could pitch in a bit more."

As Percy was making a pot of tea, a knock came at the door. Without waiting for a response, Ginny bounced in, pink-cheeked and looking insufferably cheerful about something. She was humming. Percy put a hand to his head.

"Good morning, Percy," she said. "I've been having the best day so far. Of course, I had to sneak out of the house. Mum is being _abominable_ after Neville's party, which was completely not my fault, as she told me I could go, unlike _some_ people who are still blaming me for getting caught-"

"Ginny-" Percy began.

"Oh, I know," she said, helping herself to a cup and pouring milk carelessly into it. "You want to be alone with your manly man-pain, but I'm in too good a mood to let you get away with that. Plus, I brought you biscuits." She dug into her satchel and tossed him a tin of high-end lemon-ginger frosted biscuits.

Percy blinked. "Well, thank you, Ginny. That was very thoughtful of you."

Bemused, he got a plate from the sideboard and began arranging biscuits on it. Bailey fluttered over and landed on Percy's shoulder, hooting hopefully at the prospect of more food.

"Oh, what a sweet little owl!" Ginny stood and plucked him from Percy's shoulder. Bailey gazed blearily up at her and hiccupped.

"Is he drunk?" Ginny asked, wrinkling her nose.

"Very possibly."

She sat down at the table, pouring herself some tea, Bailey still cupped in her free hand.

"See here, little fellow," she said, picking up a spoon. "Everybody likes a drink or two, but it's not even mid-morning yet. That's just bad form."

Bailey just cooed and nipped at her thumb. Percy sat back down, opening a day-old copy of _The Daily Prophet_ he'd managed to steal from Giles, Gil and Trout's lobby on his way in.

Ginny reached for the sugar, but Percy was faster. He slid it just out of her reach without bothering to look up from his paper.

"I think perhaps you've already had enough sugar for one day."

Ginny rolled her eyes and swatted at his hand, finally claiming the sugar bowl after a brief but pitched struggle. "I'm not hyper, Percy. I'm happy. I know you aren't particularly familiar with that emotional state, but most normal people are occasionally happy. Some of us are even happy a lot of the time."

"Is that meant to imply that you're normal?"

Ginny snorted and ignored the bait. "Honestly, Percy. You're going to have to get over it sometime. It's hardly as though the world's ending." She paused. "At least, not yet."

Sitting in her cupped hands, Bailey hiccupped again, looking up at her -- clearly besotted. Typical. Like just about every other male who got within ten feet of Ginny these days. Frankly, Percy was surprised their parents even let her out of the house.

Then again, it wouldn't be the first time they hadn't noticed something right in front of them.

"So," Percy said, attempting to change the subject, "since you're obviously dying to tell me, why are you happy?"

Ginny took a dramatically deep breath, and Percy was put in mind of her as a small girl. Back then she'd been chatty and excitable and a touch mischievous. That girl had been conspicuous by her absence the past few years, something Percy put down to the aftermath from Ginny's first year of school. He was, in a very private part of his heart that he would likely never share, quite happy and relieved to see glimpses of her again.

"I am going on holiday," she said, "and not one second too soon. This summer _blows_."

"It, er, blows?"

"Goats," Ginny confirmed, with an emphatic nod.

"There's an Aberforth Dumbledore joke in there somewhere," Percy said mildly, taking a sip of tea, "but we are in mixed company, after all."

Ginny snorted loudly, shaking her head and dumping Bailey unceremoniously onto the tabletop. "See, I knew there was a sense of humor hidden in you somewhere."

"So, where are you all going on holiday?"

"Not everyone, Percy. Just me. Dean's family is taking us to the shore." She stood, fetching the tin of biscuits and adding a few more to the plate.

"Are you sure that's such a good idea, Ginny?"

She took a step back, looking surprised. "Well, Mum and Dad haven't any problem with it, so I'm not sure why you should. Besides, I think they're just relieved to have me off with Muggles and out of direct danger for a week or two."

"But alone, with a boy-"

"Percy…" she began.

"Ginny," he said, warningly. "I simply can't believe our parents are allowing you to go off with some boy on holiday-"

" _His_ parents are going to be there, you know."

Percy continued as though he hadn't heard her. "It is thoroughly inappropriate at your age-"

"Unlike, say, snogging your girlfriend in a disused classroom at fifteen, which is completely appropriate," she snapped, finally appearing to lose her temper.

Percy felt himself flush red. "That is totally different. You are my younger sister and a- and a-" He floundered around for the right word. "And a girl!"

"Oh, that's nice," Ginny sniffed and flounced out.

She slammed the door. She hadn't done that in over a month. It was, Percy knew, a very bad sign. But in his current mood, he didn't much care. He got up, walked to the door and slid the bolt home. That would show her.

Ten minutes later someone banged on the door, causing him to start and spill his tea all over the kitchen counter.

"Damn it all, Ginny!" he said, rubbing a towel over his hands and heading toward the door. "If you're going to behave like a child, you'd best go and do so elsewhere. I'm not in a mood to humor you!"

"Weasley?" Celia Williams' voice came from the other side of the door, and Percy cursed himself for a fool.

He opened the door. "Williams, I'm so sorry. I thought you were someone-" He stopped, catching sight of her face. "Is something wrong?"

"I need your help."

He moved aside and gestured her into the flat. "It's nothing serious, I hope? Can I get you some tea?"

"No." She shook her head and let him lead her to a seat on the sofa. "I feel so silly. It's just- I took this morning off because I needed to figure some things out. I haven't gotten anywhere, and then I thought about you and-"

Percy was completely discomfited. "Perhaps," he said slowly," you ought to start from the beginning."

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, and she really did look very upset. "It's this new job of mine."

"Things aren't going well?"

"Oh, they've gone wonderfully. I've been very successful so far. They've consistently given me intriguing projects and more responsibility, the work environment is very positive, and the _benefits_ -"

It sounded, quite frankly, like a little slice of heaven. Percy was trying very, very hard not to burst with jealousy. It was a close thing. "And the problem is?" he asked, managing somehow not to visibly salivate at the mention of the word 'benefits.'

“My gut.”

“Your gut?”

“I know it probably sounds silly, but I generally trust my instincts and right now my instincts are telling me that something is very wrong. Everything was fine until this week. We’ve taken on a new client, some American outfit – which is suspect in itself – and now there's talk about special projects, top secret stuff. I did a little digging, and these Americans… The things they’ve done and the people they generally represent, even on paper – not the even the stuff they’ve bothered to _hide_ … Well, they make Dolores Umbridge look positively cuddly."

Percy raised an eyebrow. "I always found Madam Umbridge very polite."

"Oh, please," Williams said. "That's because you had, what? Three conversations with her, total? She was Hitler in high heels." At his skeptical look, she added, "The woman collected knickknacks: little ceramic kittens playing with yarn, adorable ragamuffin children and chubby, barefoot angels. She was straight-up evil, like the Martha Stewart, hand-knit doilies kind of evil. She made us sing carols at the Christmas party last year -- Victorian Christmas carols."

"I must have missed that," Percy mused. "I was rather drunk."

"I _wish_ I'd been. Even now, one chorus of 'Angels We Have Heard on High' and I have to find a drink." She shook her head. “You know, there was a time when this honestly wouldn’t have bothered me that much. I would have done my job, taken the paycheck and then moved on. But now-" She looked at him and there was something in her face that he couldn’t quite read. “Now, I’m finding that my conscience is a little louder than it used to be. If this new client is mixed up in something illegal or even morally questionable, I’m not sure I can do it. But before I do anything, I want to be sure I’m not jumping to conclusions because of, well, recent events.”

“Recent events?”

She shrugged but that somehow significant look was still on her face. “We all learn our lessons in different ways, Weasley.” A pause. “I came to you because you- Well, anyway, you know people. You know better than I would who to talk to about something like this – like that Auror... Kingsley is his name, I think?” She paused. “Will you help me?"

"I'm not at all sure I'm the right person to be helping you with this. Surely there are proper channels you could go through-"

"Percy, please," she said, and he realized that it was quite possibly the first time she'd ever used his given name.

"All right, all right... Celia. I'll see what I can do." He paused for a moment, deep in thought. "Who's Martha Stewart?"

*

"I can't believe you get to go on holiday," Ron said, scuffing one foot across the bedroom floor and shoving his hands moodily into his pockets.

Ginny sighed, sweeping her hair care products from the vanity and into a knapsack. Hermione was on the far bed, reading, and Ron was leaned up against the wall near her feet.

"Let it drop, won't you?"

" _Harry_ doesn't want you to go either," Ron said, as if Harry's name was supposed to be the magic word that would make her change her mind.

Ginny looked over at Harry, who was sitting cross-legged on her bed. He just frowned darkly and looked away, picking at the quilt with one hand.

"Well, if that's true, maybe he should tell me himself," she said, flinging a bottle of Bobble and Bubble's Magic (No, Really! It's *Magic*!) Hair Serum™ into her bag. "Not that it will change my mind. It's just that it might be nice to hear Harry say something for once instead of letting you two play puppeteer all the time."

"Let it go, Ron," Harry said, sounding distinctly put out at having to talk.

"He speaks!" Ginny said.

"You let it go, too," he replied, looking at her with an indecipherable expression on his face.

Ginny sighed again, even more heavily. "Well, I can't say I'll be too unhappy to leave the House of freaking Usher behind for a week. You guys are enough to make me want to brick _myself_ up in the basement."

"That wasn't in _The Fall of the House of Usher_ ," Hermione said absently, not even bothering to look up from her book. "It was _The Cask of Amontillado_. Same author, though, and you get points for the literary reference."

"Whatever." Ginny went over to her side of the bureau and yanked out a drawer, dumping her bras and panties onto the bed in front of Harry. He recoiled just slightly, his face going pink.

"Ginny!" Ron said, scandalized.

"What are you guys? Five? Yes, I own underwear. Some of it is even sexy. Deal, or get out. I have to pack."

"You aren't taking the er- sexy underwear with you on this trip, are you?" Ron asked, looking suspicious.

"This is nothing," Ginny said, holding up a lacy but fairly tame camisole. "You should have seen what Hermione took with her to Bulgaria."

Hermione, at last, put her book down. Even Harry looked up, vaguely interested. Ron, on the other hand, was surprisingly quiet. In fact, he was biting down so hard on his lower lip that it was turning white.

How unusual.

Hermione sat up. "I did, in fact, buy a nice new set of silk pajamas for that trip, which Ginny helped me pick out. Not that it meant anything. My parents went with me, so the trip was hardly a romantic getaway."

"You went to Bulgaria?" Harry said. "Why didn't I know about this?"

Hermione looked puzzled. "I'm sure I told you." A pause. "Didn't I tell you?"

"No." Harry looked a little hurt. "You didn't tell me."

"I told Ron," she offered lamely. "That's almost the same thing."

"Sure," Harry said, with that horrible fake smile he pasted on whenever he was really cheesed off.

Ginny rolled her eyes. One of these days there was going to be serious badness, and she really, really hoped she wasn't there for it. At least she'd deflected attention away from her holiday plans, though -- which had kind of been the point. The fact that everyone she knew was repressed and evasive (and, in Harry's case at least, in need of serious psycho-therapy, STAT) was annoying as hell, but it did occasionally have its uses.

"Ginny," Hermione said in a painfully obvious attempt to change the subject, "are you going to take your black shoes with you? If you weren't, I thought I might borrow them."

"Black shoes?" Ginny echoed. While Ginny wasn't exactly able to afford as many pairs of shoes as most teenage girls, she still had a fairly impressive collection – and, frankly, she couldn't imagine Hermione in any of them.

"You know, the ones with the little buckles."

"Oh, sure." Ginny had gotten them for practically nothing at a second-hand clothing store on one of her trips to visit Percy. She fairly certain they were several years behind the current Muggle fashion, but in the wizarding world that didn't mean anything. People still wore robes and pointy hats, for heaven's sake. "Yeah, you can borrow those. I'm only taking sandals with me."

"Ginny is an amazing bargain hunter," Hermione continued, even though Ron looked bored and Harry was patently not listening. "I don't even really know much about clothes and I was impressed."

Ginny couldn't hide a smile. "Only out of necessity. I'd love to walk into Gladrags and buy the whole place."

"I think your way is more interesting. It shows your creativity."

"You know," Ginny said, feeling suddenly hugely generous, "you can borrow the skirt and tights that go with those shoes, if you'd like. They'd look nice with that little top you brought back from France."

Ron rolled his eyes. Harry still didn't say anything more, just continued to stare intently at the pattern on Ginny's quilt. But Hermione smiled, looking genuinely grateful, for the shoes and the change of topic.

*

"Here's the thing," Percy found himself saying to Kingsley over a plate of chips, "Celia thinks there's something untoward about this new place she's working. She doesn't want to involve anyone official because she hasn't much more than a hunch to go on. She wants my help but-" He sighed heavily. "I haven't the first idea where to begin."

"So you want my unofficial help?" Kingsley asked, taking a long drink of stout.

Percy was having iced tea. A week of living with Bailey had nearly put him off drink altogether.

He shrugged. "I'm not sure what I want; I'm not even sure why I said I'd help."

"Aren't you?" Kingsley said over the rim of his glass, sounding far too amused.

Percy pointedly ignored it.

"I'll see what I can do for you -- without attracting too much official attention, of course."

"Thank you," Percy said, relieved. "It's probably nothing, but it does seem important to her."

"And you just want to put her mind at ease, of course," Kingsley said, grinning again. "That's only natural."

"Remind me," Percy said frostily, "why we're friends exactly?"

"Aw, you need someone to liven things up a little for you. If not for me and Ginny, you'd probably still be lying in bed with the coverlet up over your head."

Percy very pointedly ignored that (largely because it was _true_ ), and said, "Yes, Ginny... I'm rather worried about her. We had a bit of a row yesterday."

"Over what?"

"This holiday of hers. I can't believe my parents are letting her go off by herself with some boy, even if it is Dean Thomas..." Percy trailed off at the expression on Kingsley's face.

" _What_ holiday?" he said.

Percy swallowed. "You didn't know? She's gone off on two week's holiday with Thomas' family."

"Huh." Kingsley took a long drink. "Well, she didn't tell me."

"I did gather," Percy said, rather apologetically, "that it was a rather sudden decision."

Kingsley shrugged. "What are you so worried about, anyway? They're just kids."

"Well," Percy said, carefully, "I don't know about you, but I certainly remember what it was like to be a fifteen year old boy. Now, imagine yourself at fifteen on holiday with your girlfriend – your girlfriend in a _bathing costume_."

Kingsley's frown deepened. "If he tries anything, you realize, we'll have to kill him."

"Absolutely," Percy agreed.

*

The holiday turned out to be everything Ginny had hoped and then some. So, it was particularly irritating to discover that she couldn't stop thinking about Percy, or Harry, or Kingsley, or any of the rest of this mess they'd gotten themselves into.

"Is everything all right, Gin?" Dean asked. It was late afternoon and they were sprawled on the beach, making pictures out of colored sand and polished stones.

"Sure," Ginny said, blending azure and gold into the scales of the dragon Dean had just drawn.

"You've just seemed a bit distracted is all."

She smiled, propping her chin on one hand and tilting her head to look at him. "I'm sorry. Things at home… It's just difficult right now."

"I'm sorry, Ginny. I can't really imagine how that must be."

"It bites," she said succinctly. "Things are just a mess: with my brothers, with Harry, with my parents-" She shook her head. "There's nothing I can do about it, but I feel like I ought to try, you know?"

"I know," Dean said, smiling at her. "But you can't fix everything, Gin. No one expects you to."

"I just hate not being able to do anything."

"There's gotta be something," he said, reaching for a small jar of silver sand. "Even if it's just something that gets you out of the house and away from all the drama."

Ginny considered that a moment. "I've been thinking about asking Fred and George for a job. At least during the summer and on holidays, but Mum is still trying to adjust to the idea of them working there, let alone any of the rest of us."

"I haven't been to see the shop yet, but Seamus says it's wicked."

Ginny laughed. "Knowing the twins, it would almost have to be."

Dean grinned meaningfully. "They aren't the only Weasleys who are wicked."

Ginny raised an eyebrow. "Keep that up and I'll have to tell Ron you were talking about him..."

"Oh, very funny." Dean got up and offered her a hand, pulling her to her feet. "What would you say to another, uh, swim? You know, before the sun goes down?"

Ginny smiled up at him, squeezing his hand. "I'd say that sounds just about perfect."

*

Percy hadn't heard from Kingsley all week and had begun to worry that he hadn't found anything about Celia's employers.

He wasn't far wrong.

"Well, kid." Kingsley spread his hands. "I've got nothing. From all reports, Maxwell and Edison are pillars of the community – a little on the traditionalist side, but nothing radical. The client list _is_ a little suspect, but again nothing obviously illegal, unless having distasteful opinions is against the law…"

“It’s likely only a matter of time on that front,” Percy murmured.

They were back at the same pub they'd met at before, only this time Kingsley was having iced tea, too. He'd met Bailey briefly at Percy's flat. Apparently, it had made an impression.

"Are you quite certain?” he continued. “Celia seemed so sure..."

Kingsley shrugged. "She could still be right, kid. I just can't find any proof one way or the other."

Percy sipped thoughtfully at his iced tea. "There must be some way to figure this out."

"There might be. Then again, there might not." Kingsley spread his hands. "There's no real harm in giving it a shot, but your, uh, friend may have to just resign in the end if it bothers her that much."

"I'd like to prevent that if I can," Percy said. "Being unemployed isn't pleasant, by any means."

“I know."

"The question, though," Percy said, picking idly at a relish plate on the table between them, "is how to help her?"

Kingsley grinned widely. "Well, you could always go undercover."

*

The next afternoon Percy found himself in the elegantly appointed reception area of Maxwell and Edison Political Consulting, holding a bouquet of pink daisies and asking politely whether Ms. Celia Williams was available for lunch.

"I'll check," the receptionist said. "One moment, please."

Percy took advantage of the pause to look around. The offices were housed in one of those converted loft spaces, redone in ultra-modern glass and chrome. Behind the reception desk a metal spiral staircase led to the upper loft where, he assumed, the offices were.

"Ms. Williams will be down in a moment," the receptionist said, putting an old-fashioned message container into a compressed-air tube. "Can I get you anything while you wait?"

"No, thanks," Percy said, and looked up in time to see Celia descending the spiral staircase. She'd cut her hair since he'd seen her last. It just barely grazed her shoulders, looking very sleek and professional. She wore a pair of designer glasses with gunmetal grey frames, even though Percy was fairly certain that she didn't need them to see. She looked very pretty, something Percy sternly reminded himself to stop noticing. He was here on business, after all. She also looked, he noticed, confused and not a little bit concerned.

"Percy," she said, keeping her voice very even as she came to stand beside him. "What are you doing here?"

"I thought I'd take you to lunch," Percy said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. Her face was almost as pink as the gerberas when he pulled away.

The receptionist gave Celia a knowing look, but wisely didn't say anything.

"Well, why don't you come on up to my office and we can figure out where to go. Unless you already had someplace in mind?" she asked, leading him up the stairs.

"I thought I'd let you pick." A pause. "Don't you want these?" He offered her the flowers.

Halfway up the steps, she turned back toward him and took the bouquet. Her cheeks flushed even darker.

"Come on then."

They walked through the high-ceilinged loft, threading their way through experimental office spaces and ergonomic chairs. The walls were lined with those same antique message tubes. Canisters shot through them occasionally with a soft swoosh. Celia had a small office in one corner, with glass walls that faced the rest of the office. It wasn't large, but she had a window overlooking the street and a very nice desk.

"What was that all about?" she asked once they were inside and she'd closed the door.

"I can't bring you flowers and take you out for expensive meals?" Percy asked innocently.

"You'd be more than welcome to, if you'd ever-" She stopped, folding her arms across her chest and regaining her composure with some difficulty. "What are you really here for?"

"If I'd ever what?" Percy asked, somewhat bemused, picking up a framed picture from her desk. It was a black and white photo of an attractive couple at the beach. It didn't move. "Your parents?"

"Yes." She took the photo from him and replaced it on the desk next to a grumpy-looking fighting fish in an oblong crystal bowl. "You still haven't answered my question."

"What do you think I'm here for?" he asked. "You wanted my help."

"I appreciate that, Percy," she said, flopping down into the chair behind her desk. "But I did think you'd at least warn me before you showed up to play detective."

"I just wanted to see the place," he said, feeling a bit defensive. "Get a feeling for it."

"Well…" She spread her hands. "This is it."

Percy looked around. For all intents and purposes, it was an everyday office complex, filled with desks and people hunched over them.

"And what did you plan to do once you'd seen the place?"

"This is- er, as far as I'd gotten."

Celia nearly broke into a smile at that, but just then a message canister dropped into the slot behind her desk. She opened it and her eyes widened.

"Oh, dear."

"What is it?"

She shook her head. "Mr. Edison? My boss? He wants to meet you."

"Why on earth?"

She stood, straightening her skirt and running a hand over her hair. "That's the question, isn't it? Oh, hell. What have I done?"

"Calm down." Percy walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "We don't know anything yet. We'll just have to play it cool."

Celia just gave him a dark look and led the way out of her office and up to the executive suites on the third floor.

Edison was waiting for them on a wide mezzanine overlooking the office below. He was middle-aged, but still handsome, with salt-and-pepper hair and a smile clearly calculated to put people at ease.

It didn't work on Percy.

"Mr. Weasley," Edison said, extending a hand. "John Edison. Very nice to meet you at last."

Perplexed, Percy took his offered hand and shook it. "Nice to meet you as well. But how did you-"

Edison smiled. "I keep abreast of politics. You and Miss Williams were fairly visible members of the previous Minister's staff. We've been keeping an eye on you. So when Nancy mentioned that you were here, naturally-"

"Naturally," Percy echoed.

"I understand that you're still in the market for a position," Edison said, and Percy began to relax a little.

If that was all this was about, so much the better. Percy glanced sidelong at Celia and a little of the tension had left her face as well.

"I am, as a matter of fact."

"Good." Edison nodded. "You haven't settled for the first thing to come along. That shows an impressive amount of character, Mr. Weasley. Are you still considering politics as a career, or would you like to move on to something else?"

Percy shifted his weight from foot to foot, considering. "I enjoyed working in government, but I'm not sure I'd want to work directly for the Ministry again."

Edison nodded again, looking at Percy approvingly. He had the distinct feeling that he'd given Edison the answer he'd wanted to hear.

"Well, very nice to have met you," Percy said, taking Celia's hand. "We're on our way to lunch."

"We were just heading to lunch ourselves. Perhaps you'd both join us?" Edison said. "If it wouldn't be disrupting your plans, of course."

Percy squeezed her fingers and nodded. Celia smiled and accepted with the appearance of perfect calm, but tiny lines of tension remained around her eyes. She also didn't pull her hand away as they walked out of the building, something Percy kept telling himself was a sign of nerves.

Edison and another highly-placed member of the firm, a stern but attractive woman in her mid-thirties, took them to a vaguely Continental bistro tucked away on a side street. It was one of those places with cuisine that could only be described as 'fusion' and no prices on the wine list.

It was also certainly the nicest restaurant Percy had seen the inside of in a long while.

"You had quite the bright future, Mr. Weasley," Edison said as white wine was being poured. "It really was a shame."

"Thank you, sir."

"You and Miss Williams are exactly the sort of young people we're in need of in these unsettled times. Dedicated, loyal, and," he added, with emphasis, "forward-thinking. That's going to be a very important skill to have, and probably sooner than later."

"I'm afraid," Percy said, "that it hasn't been without some personal cost. There are days when I wonder-"

"Nonsense. Your position was all the more impressive given your family's somewhat... eccentric loyalties."

"I disagree with my parents, but I respect their right to their opinions..." Percy began carefully.

"Of course, of course, my boy," Edison said quickly. "We should always encourage the free exchange of ideas. Though, I must point out, that in these times we live in those ideas can often be dangerous."

Percy took a thoughtful sip of wine, considering carefully before he spoke, "And what would you recommend that we do when faced with such dangerous ideas?"

Edison smiled, and this time there was nothing reassuring about it at all. "Why, we find creative and persuasive ways to disseminate our point of view, of course."

Percy didn't doubt for a second that they were very good at it.

*

The whole thing was creepy. Edison was creepy, the firm was creepy, the clients were creepy, their methods were creepy.

It was also entirely possible that they weren't wrong.

That was the bit that kept sticking with Percy. It stuck with him through lunch, through his hurried goodbye to Celia, through teatime and all the way to dinner. He lay in bed thinking about it well into the night.

The world had become, in the past year or two, a very dangerous and unpredictable place. Was this really the time for the kind of divisiveness that his parents and Albus Dumbledore advocated? There was a very good argument for solidarity, no matter how it was achieved.

Still, it left Percy a little unsettled.

It was Saturday morning and Celia was camped out in his living room under a fleece throw. She'd shown up near sunrise, pale and apologetic and claiming she couldn't sleep. Percy had sent an owl off to Kingsley for help, determined to resolve the situation as soon as possible. Then he made tea and tucked Celia in on the sofa. She didn't fall asleep, though.

Percy curled up in a large club chair across from her with a mug of his own. "Don't you think you ought to try and sleep?"

She shook her head. "I'm sorry for waking you up. You can go back to bed if you want. I just- I just didn't want to be by myself."

"No, no. I'm fine," Percy said, trying unsuccessfully to stifle a wide yawn.

"I know it's silly, but- Well, I think I’m having a crisis of conscience." There was a long pause. “It’s a first for me, Percy. I’m pretty freaked out.”

"We've hardly found them guilty of anything more distasteful than manipulating public opinion -- and that's hardly new in political circles."

"That's true," she said slowly. "But the whole thing is still pretty unsettling for me."

"Look," he said, moving over to sit next to her, "after everything that's gone on lately, we're all looking for dark wizards everywhere. Just because you or I don't agree with their political methods, doesn't mean that they're evil."

"I suppose." Celia nodded slowly. "Maybe I did overreact."

"You don't have to agree with me, you know. You've asked my opinion and I offered it, but that doesn't mean I'm right."

She looked up, as if surprised. "I trust you, Percy. I trust your judgment."

That caught him off-guard. He laughed sharply before he could stop himself.

Celia sat up, putting her cup aside, and took hold of his arm. "I mean it. Why else would I have come to you about this? I have other friends, other people in my life, but no one else is like y-"

He shook his head. "Don't be silly, Celia."

"You always do that," she said, letting go of him. "Why do you do that?"

"What on earth are you talking about?" he said, moving away from her and straightening up.

"Exactly," she muttered, then, "You know, the firm wanted me to... But I can't imagine you would-"

"What is it?"

"They wanted me to speak with you about the possibility of accepting a position. Edison seemed to think you would be interested." She paused. "Are you?"

Percy paused, considering how best to answer. "I've been out of work a long time, Celia," he began, but was cut off by a knock at the door.

"Kingsley." Percy opened the door and blinked. "I didn't mean that you had to come right away."

"I'm used to the crazy hours," he said, walking into the flat. "It's an occupational hazard."

"I never would have imposed on you at this hour if I'd thought you'd-"

"Forget it, kid." Then catching sight of Celia, he said, "Well, hello there."

"Kingsley," Percy said, warningly, and gestured toward a chair.

Kingsley sat, but couldn't quite get rid of his knowing grin. "So," he said, finally attending to the matter at hand. "What did you want to see me for? You finally want to go get the bad guys?"

"Not quite. I want proof, one way or the other. All I know for sure right now is that Celia doesn't like the way Maxwell and Edison conduct their business."

"You ever seen Maxwell?" Kingsley asked Celia.

"No. The word around the office is that he's a bit of a silent partner."

Kingsley looked thoughtful. "That's what I've been hearing, too. It makes me wonder if maybe he's the one we ought to be concentrating on."

"He keeps an office there," Percy said. "I thought we might take a look at what he keeps in it."

Kingsley looked impressed. "That's one way to get the job done. Go right to the source. I'm in. When do we go?"

"Tonight," Percy said.

"Percy, are you sure?" Celia asked. "I don't want you to put yourself in danger-"

"Aw," Kingsley said, clearly enjoying himself. "Danger is Percy's middle name."

To her credit, Celia just gave him a look.

"No one has a sense of humor in the morning." He stood. "Okay, kid, you give me details; I'll get what we need to do this right. You're sure this is how you want to do it?"

"Absolutely."

"Okay. Nice to finally meet you, by the way," he said to Celia, smiling and showing far too many teeth.

Percy cleared his throat. "If you don't mind."

Kingsley turned that grin on Percy and all but winked. "Not at all, kid. See you later."

*

Breaking in should have been hard, but apparently Kingsley was better at this sort of thing than he had any reason to be.

"I thought," Percy whispered softly, holding his lit wand close to the lock on the door to Maxwell's office, "that Aurors were supposed to be on the right side of the law."

"Desperate times, kid," Kingsley said, and the lock came open with a soft sigh.

"There's another kind?" Percy shook his head. "Besides, shouldn't you at least be saying something like, 'I can't believe you talked me into this'?"

Kingsley chuckled. "Nah. I can totally believe you talked me in to this. What I can't believe is that you came up with this plan in the first place. You must _really_ like that girl."

Percy shot a frosty look at the back of Kingsley's head as they slipped into the office, but didn't say anything.

"You take the file cabinet. I'll try the safe," Kingsley said, closing the door quietly behind them.

Percy worked his way quickly through the first set of files, then the second, but didn't find anything. Kingsley had the safe open in record time, pulling papers out and scanning though them.

A few minutes later, Percy straightened up with a groan. "This was a spectacularly bad idea. I should have known they wouldn't be stupid enough to leave something incriminating just lying aro-"

"I think I just found something," Kingsley said, dropping a roll of parchment to the desk and leaning over it with his wand.

"What is it?" Percy joined him at the desk.

"A list of names- Oh, man. This is bad." Kingsley shook his head.

"Let me see," Percy said, reaching for the parchment, but Kingsley swept it away.

"Uh-uh, kid. Sorry, but I can't let you. These people are already compromised enough."

Percy went cold. "You don't trust me. I can't believe it."

"It's not that," Kingsley said softly, sounding genuinely sorry. "This is a fuck-up of gigantic proportions. I’m just doing some damage control. No one sees this list but Dumbledore. Let's look around, though, and see if there's anything else in here."

"Are you sure you trust me to look?" Percy bit out.

Kingsley sighed heavily. "Do _not_ take this personally, Percy. It's not about you. It wouldn't matter who you were. I wouldn't let Ginny see it, either."

“If you say so,” Percy sniffed and began flipping through a ledge on the desk. “Well, this is odd…”

“What’s odd?”

“This…” He indicated a column in one of the ledger sheets.

“You’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.”

“I would have thought it was obvious…” Kingsley gave him a very dark look, and Percy amended, “I mean, there are two sets of numbers here. One appears to be the ‘official’ financial records, and the other the _real_ tally. The real books have a suspicious number of outgoing payments to individuals not on the firm’s official payroll…”

“Bribes?”

“Very likely.”

Kingsley grinned at him. “Nice work, kid. I wouldn’t have picked up on that.”

Percy closed the book and picked it up to take it with them.

“Leave it here. We’re here illeg- unofficially, that is. Anything we discover tonight is useless as evidence. We’re just here to get an idea of where to _start_ looking officially.”

“All right.” Percy returned the ledger to its place, and busied himself rummaging through Maxwell's desk drawers. At the bottom of one wide drawer he found a stack of photos with another list of names attached. Percy flipped briefly through the photos. They looked like surveillance, pictures of men and women in various offices and shops, going about their daily business. Percy scanned down the list, not recognizing any of the names until he got near the bottom. Then, one name made him stop.

 _Weasley, Arthur_

He flipped to the bottom of the stack of photos until he found them: pictures of The Burrow, of his mother, of Ginny...

"Oh my God," Percy said, dropping the file back into the drawer.

"What?" Kingsley was at his elbow in an instant. He snatched up the photos and began looking through them.

"Does that mean what I think it means?" Percy asked.

"No," Kingsley said firmly. "We don't know what it means. We don't know whether there's any real danger-"

"Except for the people who've been stalking my family, of course," Percy snapped, moving toward the door and pulling his wand from his belt.

Kingsley looked up sharply. "Now, don't run off and do something stu-"

But Percy was already gone.

*

The fact that he managed to make it to the Burrow without leaving pieces of himself in Maxwell's office was nothing short of a miracle.

He stumbled through to the kitchen in the dark. There was no fire in the hearth, no light anywhere.

The house was empty, deserted. Dead.

Abruptly Percy found that he couldn't breathe. "Mum! Dad!" He ran through the kitchen and up the back stairs. "Ginny!"

But Ginny wouldn't have been here, he told himself. She was on holiday with her boyfriend. Maybe the others were gone as well. He needed to calm down. But the house didn't just feel empty; it felt abandoned. The air was stale and heavy with dust. It felt as though its occupants were never coming back and everything in the house knew it, including him.

His hands began to shake. He sat down on the landing, pressed his knees together and tried to catch his breath.

"Think, think, think," he murmured. He had to go about this logically.

The funny thing about logic, though, was that it did very little to stop him from panicking. Because logic very clearly indicated that his family was gone, vanished into the night like a story from Percy's childhood, and he was too late to do anyone any good, as usual.

Ginny was going to be so disappointed in him. How on earth was he going to tell her?

He walked numbly back down to the kitchen and sat at the table, dropping his head to his hands.

"They aren't here," a familiar voice came from the doorway. Kingsley walked over and sat beside him at the table. "I could have told you that if you'd stuck around and listened to me instead of running off half-cocked."

"Where are they then?" At Kingsley's words, a little of the feeling began to come back in to Percy's limbs.

"I can't tell you that, kid. They're safe where they are, though."

"Did they know they were being watched? Is that why they left?"

Kingsley shook his head. "Nah, but something like this wasn't entirely unexpected either." He paused. "We're going to have to warn the other people on that list, though."

"Why didn't you tell me they weren't here?"

"I said, you left so quickly-"

Percy cut him off. "Before that. Why didn't anyone tell me?"

Kingsley sighed deeply. "Are you sure you want the honest answer to that?"

Percy flushed and opened his mouth to retort, but Kingsley was speaking again.

"Besides, kid, it wasn't my secret to tell – very literally. I could tell you that your family left the Burrow, but not where they went. Almost no one could tell you that."

" _Almost_ no one?"

"One person, really. But that doesn't matter much now." Kingsley folded his hands on the table in front of him. "You may not like it, Percy, but you're going to have to prove yourself. You're going to have to be better and more honest than anyone else if you want your family to trust you again."

"It's not as though I betrayed them to Voldemort, you know," Percy snapped. "I hardly think it's the same thing."

"No, it isn't, and that's why you and I are sitting here. That's why I helped Ginny drag your sorry drunk carcass home two months ago instead of letting you drown yourself in a whiskey bottle. You're a good kid and you just picked the wrong people to trust. You certainly aren't the first." He paused. "But all the same, your family can't trust you. You're going to have to work at it if you want them to. You can't, Percy, take the easy way out on this one."

"What if I don't care whether they trust me again?"

"If that's true, then why are you here?"

"Wanting them to be safe isn't the same as wanting them in my life again."

"Well, yeah. Okay, that's true. But you care, kid, and that does mean something."

"Of course it does. It just might not mean what you think it does."

Kingsley watched him for a long moment, considering. "There is something you want, though. You'd better figure out what it is, kid, and quick. You may be running out of time."

*

On Monday, Ginny turned up Percy's flat, looking very tanned, very relaxed and demanding jam doughnuts.

"And proper coffee," she said, standing in the doorway and crossing her arms. "Not that weak-willed white swill you try to pass off as the real thing. Get your wallet, I'm starving to death while you sit there like a moron."

Percy did as she said without a word.

He didn't actually speak until they were seated in the bakery, a tray of warm, fresh doughnuts between them while Ginny inhaled her coffee with almost pornographic glee. She'd prattled the entire way down the block, chatting gaily about her swimming holiday and how wonderful Dean was, how wonderful his parents were and how wonderful the entire world was. Their row from the week before, apparently, had been conveniently forgotten thanks to a week of sun and saltwater and getting her own way.

She stopped, just long enough to take a deep swallow of coffee and said, "What is the matter with you, Percy? I've seen corpses livelier than you are today." She paused, then grinned. "Then again, I suppose you have, too."

Percy ignored the joke. "Did you ever plan on telling me that the family had left home?"

"What?"

"You've left The Burrow. I know you have, because I went there."

Ginny dropped her coffee cup to the table with a dull thunk. "Oh." Her eyes widened. "Oh. You went there? Why on earth?"

"That hardly matters now. I just- Everything was empty and-" He took a breath. "I thought..."

Ginny went very pale. "Oh, Percy… _No._ We're just...staying somewhere else."

"Ah, I see."

"It's only temporary. I didn't mean to-" She faltered, looking upset. "If I could have told you... No, that's a lie. I wouldn't have told you." She shook her head. "All I can say is, I'm sorry."

"Of course," he said coldly.

"Stop that! Don't act like that!" She looked down into her empty cup for a long moment. "You were really worried about us?"

"Yes, Ginny, I was. Not that it matters now."

"Of course it matters. Honestly, you can be such a tool sometimes." She bit viciously into a doughnut, jam squirting everywhere. She blinked rapidly, and if he hadn't known better he'd have sworn she was on the verge of tears.

"Ginny," he said, softening. "I didn't mean-"

"I _am_ sorry," she said, reaching out and squeezing his hand for just a moment.

"So am I," he replied, and bought her another cup of coffee.

*

Celia showed up at his flat the next morning and Percy began to suspect that he would never be allowed to sleep in again.

"Well, I've given notice. I'm back in the ranks of the unemployed." She flung herself onto the sofa. "Not a moment too soon; there's to be an official inquiry into the firm’s financial dealings. I don't suppose you know anything about that?"

"Kingsley may have mentioned something."

"Well, hell." She pulled the fleece blanket – which she’d apparently claimed for her own at some point – up over her legs and said, "My gut was right. I guess should be pleased, but-"

"I know, Celia," Percy said, padding over to the sofa in his robe and slippers to bring her a cup of strong tea. "It's difficult."

She looked up at him and managed a shaky smile. "We did the right thing, I know we did." She paused and took an uneven breath. "It still sucks."

Bailey the Moral Object Lesson on the Dangers of Alcohol hooted sympathetically from his perch.

Celia craned her head around to look at him. "Where did this little fellow come from? He's precious!"

"He's a friend of Bill W.," Percy muttered.

"What?"

"He's a post owl," Percy said. "Or at least, he was. He got the sack the same as you and I. I guess I felt a bit sorry for him."

"That is incredibly sweet. I never would have imagined you had it in you."

Percy was trying to decide just how to take that, when Bailey sailed over and deposited himself in Celia's lap.

"Oh, what a darling. He's perfect, Percy. I've always wanted one of these."

"You don't have an owl?" Percy asked, surprised that he'd never noticed before.

"My mother is, shall we say, less than fond of animals. I've never had so much as a toad."

"That's awful," Percy said, grabbing his own cup of tea and joining her. "Hermes was the best thing that could have happened to me at Hogwarts. Owls are very useful and incredibly loyal."

Bailey cuddled up against Celia's elbow, cooing contentedly.

"I think he prefers women," Percy observed. "He likes Ginny a lot, too." An idea struck him. "If you haven't got an owl already, why don't you take Bailey?"

"Really?" Celia said. "You wouldn't mind?"

"Not at all. I already have Hermes, and I really only took Bailey because no one else wanted him-"

Bailey's little head popped up and he made an indignant sound.

"It's true and you know it," Percy said. "Just be glad I took pity on you." He paused for a moment. "There is one thing, though."

Celia looked up questioningly.

"He has… Er, that is to say, he's a bit of a…" Percy swallowed hard. "He hits the sauce a bit, I'm afraid. That's what got him bounced out of the owl post."

Celia laughed suddenly. "Really? A drunk owl? I've never heard of such a thing."

"He's rather fond of Tuaca, if he can get it," Percy continued seriously. "Any of the sweeter liqueurs, really. Though not crème de banane, for some reason."

Celia laughed again, looking at Percy like he'd just given her a diamond or some equally expensive and impressive present.

"Perhaps he just doesn't like bananas?" She patted Bailey on the head. "What do you say, Monsieur Bailey? Do you not fancy the syrup of the banana? It is very good for the digestion, you know."

Percy just shook his head.

There was an extended pause. Percy looked up to find Celia watching him; Bailey nestled in the crook of one arm. She smiled when their eyes met.

"What is it?"

"You're-" She paused and smiled again. His breath caught. "You're very surprising sometimes, Percy."

"It's just an owl-"

"Nonsense. It's a lovely gesture. Thank you."

She looked down at the top of Bailey's head, and suddenly Percy found that he couldn't look away. But, he reminded himself, swallowing around the bitter lump that had suddenly lodged itself in his throat, she thought he was a good person. She said she trusted him, of all the ridiculous things for her to do... He wasn't trustworthy and he wasn't good, and the sooner she realized it, the better.

"You're looking at me funny," she said, looking up after a moment.

"Was I?" He paused, took a breath and said, "Celia, I think you should know- I considered that offer from Edison. Seriously."

"I know you did." She seemed utterly unconcerned by the fact. "I would have been surprised if you hadn't."

"And it doesn't bother you?"

She just shrugged.

"You told me the other day- You said you trusted me. Does knowing this change that?"

"No. Would you expect it to?" She leaned in and put her free hand on his knee. "Percy, you don't owe me anything, certainly not an explanation. You may not always be right, but you're honest. You don't lie."

"I suppose I don't."

"You don't," she said, pushing the blanket aside and standing up. "You'd be terrible at it. You're honest to a fault." Bailey hopped onto her outstretched arm and scrabbled his way up to her shoulder. "I'm not surprised that you considered the offer. I would have been very surprised if you'd accepted, though. You're cautious and pragmatic. You're also ambitious, but not to the point where you would sacrifice your principles."

"Perhaps not," Percy said, not entirely convinced himself.

"You wouldn't," Celia said firmly. "I don't have nearly that kind of conviction. Sometimes I wish I did."

"Only sometimes?" Percy said, smiling slightly and attempting to change the subject.

"Only sometimes," she agreed seriously. "If it were me, I'd never have stood up to my family the way you did."

Percy paused for a long moment. "What if it was the wrong thing to do? What if I was wrong, and I did it anyway?"

"Did you think it was wrong at the time?"

"No."

"Then at least you know that you followed your conscience."

"For selfish reasons."

Celia snorted. "Doesn't everyone? Deep down? It's all selfish on some level." She leaned down to him again. "Stop punishing yourself, Percy. Did you mess up? Maybe. The real question is, have you learned from it?"

She kissed him softly on the cheek and headed for the door.

"Celia-"

She stopped, but didn't turn around.

"Thank you."

"No problem," she said, and shut the door behind her.


	5. Somewhere In Between

He really ought to have seen it coming.

For the first time in over a year, he felt somewhat like himself. Not just familiar, but better than he had in quite a long time. Percy had never put much stock in the idea that ‘pride goeth’ or any of that. However, simple observation over time had taught him that whenever something good happened, something bad was probably already on its way.

In this case, it wasn’t so much bad as it was complicated, but from where Percy sat these days, complicated was bad enough.

It was the last Sunday in August, the morning misty and already too hot. Percy sat in the kitchen debating whether he even ought to bother making tea. The very idea of steam in his enclosed flat made him start to sweat.

Despite the fact that it was before nine o’clock on a Sunday morning, someone knocked at his door. Percy was fairly certain he knew who it was. Actually, a nasty voice in his head reminded him, there were a very limited number of people that it could be these days. Percy ignored it and opened the door.

“Hullo, Percy,” Celia said, grinning at him. “Having a good morning?” She was flushed and sweaty, in trainers and running shorts, and clutching a bag from the bakery down the lane. “I was out for a run and thought I’d drop by with breakfast.”

Celia was very definitely a morning person, and Percy was very definitely not.

“You ran all this way? But your flat is absolute _miles_ from here.”

“That’s the general idea, Percy,” she said, and headed for the kitchen.

Shaking his head, Percy started after her, closing the door without looking.

“Ow!”

The door handle collided with something soft and Percy turned back around to find Ginny, standing in the doorway and rubbing melodramatically at her elbow.

“That hurt, Percy. You hit me with the door,” she added reproachfully.

“Yes, I did notice,” he said, as she pushed past him into the flat. “What are you doing here so early? Why does everyone seem to think that I like getting up with the sun?”

“Percy? Who are you talking to…?” Celia started out of the kitchen but stopped short, catching sight of Ginny.

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence in which Percy realized that both women were looking at him expectantly.

“Yes, well...” He coughed. “I suppose it is about time you met the family, Celia – one piece of it, anyway.”

Celia just twisted a dishtowel around one wrist and raised an eyebrow at him.

“This is my sister Ginny. Ginny, this is a good friend of mine, Celia Williams.”

“Uh… hi?” Ginny said.

“Hello,” Celia said, smiling at her. “There’s breakfast, if you want some.”

Ginny perked up noticeably. “Yes! Coffee?”

“Freshly brewed.” Celia held the door open while Ginny sped past. Percy followed, but Celia caught him by the arm. “I can leave if you prefer,” she said softly into his ear. “I know things with your family are strained just at the moment.”

Surprising himself, Percy laughed. “That is true, but not with Ginny. Not most of the time, at least,” he amended. “She’s the only one who doesn’t avoid me all together.”

“I can hear you, you know,” Ginny said, pouring a very large cup of coffee. She pointed at herself with her free hand. “Teenager, not deaf.”

“Who can tell the difference, really?” he replied dryly, and Ginny gave him an evil look.

Celia laughed and took a seat at the kitchen table. “Because you’re such an old man, Percy.” She looked up at Ginny. “Was he born forty? Or is it a recent development?”

Ginny took a long drink of coffee and began piling a plate with kippers. “Well-"

“Don’t answer that,” Percy said. The last thing he wanted to discuss in front of Celia was his childhood relationships with his siblings. “Have a crumpet.”

Ginny gave him an odd look, but took the one he offered her.

“So, you’re here, uh, early,” she said to Celia, with just the slightest raise of her eyebrow.

“Celia stopped by with breakfast,” Percy replied firmly, determined to quash even the glimmer of impropriety.

“Oh,” Ginny said and sat, looking, if anything, a little disappointed in him.

Percy grabbed a plate of his own and soon they were all seated around the table, eating – though he noticed that Celia only had coffee and half a crumpet, without jam or butter.

She caught him staring at her mostly-empty plate and said, a little too quickly, “I’m not on a diet or anything. I just like to eat light when I run, especially in the morning.”

Ginny nodded her agreement and Percy had the sudden sense that perhaps introducing these two to one another was not the smartest decision he’d made recently. If they ever ganged up on him, he’d be done for.

“I know what you mean,” Ginny said, gesturing with her crumpet. Melted butter splattered onto the tablecloth. “Before Quidditch practice, I hardly eat at all. It’s even worse before a game.”

“Do you play on your House team?” Celia asked politely, sipping her coffee.

“Oh, yes,” Ginny said. “Everyone in the family plays.”

Celia looked up, questioningly, at Percy.

“Everyone _except_ me,” Percy corrected, trying not to sound bitter.

“Oh.” Celia went slightly pink. Ginny, on the other hand, did not.

“How’s the drunk owl?” she asked instead, and Percy remembered, belatedly, that he’d mentioned giving Bailey to Celia.

“He’s not a drunk!” Celia said, somewhat defensively. “He’s just been depressed. Since he moved in with me, he’s been much improved. Half a thimble of wine with dinner, and maybe a little nip of port once a week -- nothing more.”

Percy looked down quickly, hiding a smile.

“He really just needs someone to be on his side, to let him know that they understand.” She paused. “There’s nothing wrong with Bailey that a little love and attention won’t fix.”

“If only it were as easy with people,” Ginny said, sounding uncharacteristically serious.

“If only,” Celia agreed.

Percy suddenly discovered that he was very, very interested in the contents of his coffee cup.

“Anyway,” Ginny said, “I’d better get back before Hermione wakes up and discovers I’ve gone. She’ll lecture me until my ears bleed, if she finds out… Thanks for the breakfast, especially the coffee. We never have enough.”

“Hermione is staying with you?” Percy asked, looking up. “I assume Harry is as well, then?”

Ginny chewed her lip, looking as though she was afraid she’d said something she shouldn’t. “Percy, I- I’m not really supposed to talk about Harry-stuff. With anyone!” she added quickly. “Not just you.”

“All right,” Percy said. “Just be careful. I know you like Harry…”

Ginny rolled her eyes. “How many times do I have to tell you people that I do not like Harry anym-"

“I meant,” Percy said, “as a friend. I know you like him, and so does Ron. But it worries me. Harry doesn’t always show the best judgment.”

She rolled her eyes again. “And nobody else in this room has ever been guilty of that.”

“I’m simply concerned about you, Ginny.”

“All right, fine.” She sighed heavily. “We’ll all be careful. Happy?”

“No,” he said. “But it’s a start. And you shouldn’t sneak out, even to come here. Anything could happen.”

She smacked him on the shoulder and headed for the door. “Nice to meet you, Celia,” she called over her shoulder.

“You, too.” Celia shook her head. “Your sister is something else,” she said as the door closed behind Ginny.

“Yes, but I’m still trying to figure out _what_.”

Celia leaned back and looked at him appraisingly. “She’s good for you, I think – a good influence.”

Percy laughed dryly. “Lord help us all.”

*

Celia and Ginny weren’t his only visitors that day, though at least Kingsley had the sense to wait until the afternoon to turn up. When he got there, he looked worn-out – so tired, in fact, that Percy didn’t have the heart to scold him when he put his feet up on the coffee table.

“Are you quite all right?” Percy asked, taking off his glasses to clean them. He was sitting across from Kingsley in the living room, while the kettle boiled in the kitchen.

“I’m fine, kid. Just tired.” He grinned. “Getting too old for those late nights, I guess.”

“I see,” Percy said. “Business or pleasure?”

“Neither, actually. At least, not official business.”

“Something for Dumbledore, then?” Percy asked casually. Kingsley’s work with Dumbledore and his associates was a subject they usually skirted. Percy wasn’t even sure what made him bring it up.

“Actually, yes,” Kingsley said, looking uncharacteristically serious. He dropped his feet from the table and leaned forward, folding his hands. “There’s something I’ve got to ask you, Percy.”

Not ‘kid.’ Not ‘Weasley.’ But ‘Percy.’ This couldn’t be good. Percy slid his glasses back on carefully.

“I see.”

“Nah. You probably don’t.” Kingsley smiled, and Percy relaxed a little bit. But only a little bit.

“I want to see what you think of this.” He held up a classified ad, torn rather messily from the Sunday _Prophet_.

Percy blinked. “What is this?”

“Just something to think about,” Kingsley said, handing it over.

“It’s an advert for office space,” Percy said blankly. “Why on earth would I need to lease an office?”

Kingsley shrugged. “You haven’t found a new job, right? So why not go into business for yourself?”

“Doing what exactly? In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m much better at taking orders than giving them.”

“I don’t know about that,” Kingsley said, with a slight grin. “You were Head Boy, weren’t you?”

“That is entirely different than what you’re proposing – and I’m still a little fuzzy on what exactly you are proposing.”

“There’s a lot of bad stuff out there, Percy -- vampires and ghouls and things like that -- and there are an awful lot of people who need help-“

“Isn’t that what Aurors are for?” Percy said.

“Well, it’s too late for you to become an Auror. But you’re good at that sort of thing, and being an Auror isn’t the only way to help people.”

“If you’re suggesting I join Dumbledore, I doubt they’d have me-“

“You might be surprised about that. But joining Dumbledore isn’t the only option either.” Kingsley took the ad back from him. “What I’m suggesting is that you do what you can to help, but on your own terms. Work with Dumbledore, don’t work with Dumbledore, whatever. Be your own boss – but join the fight. Do something.”

It did sound tempting -- and hadn’t Percy been wishing for some direction, some purpose, ever since the Ministry? But he wasn’t sure this was the direction he wanted to be headed in. He’d been thinking more along the lines of something that would bring in a tidy amount of money, maybe a little prestige… the sort of thing that would impress people. Chasing nasty creatures around alleys certainly wasn’t impressive.

“I’m not sure,” he began. “Besides, where would I even get the money for an office or any of the other things one needs to start a business? I’ve never exactly had money, even in the best of times.”

For his part, Kingsley looked relieved that Percy was even considering the possibility. He grinned. “That’s all taken care of. I’ve found you a willing patron. We’re having tea with her. Tomorrow.”

“Oh, well then…” Percy paused. “Who is this ‘willing patron’?”

“Adelaide Longbottom.”

Percy had the memory of a rather imposing figure of a woman, brandishing an antique katana sword at him in the aftermath of her grandson’s disastrous birthday party.

“She’s… rather formidable, as I remember.”

“That she is,” Kingsley laughed.

Percy was staring into space, considering the situation. “It all sounds so innocent and straightforward…”

“Come on now, Percy,” Kingsley began, spreading his hands helplessly. “The lady just asked us to tea…”

“…and, yet, somehow I’m having trouble believing you,” Percy said.

“Come on, kid…”

“What exactly makes you think that Adelaide Longbottom will have any interest in helping me?”

Kingsley grinned. “Call it a hunch.”

“You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t put much faith in hunches anymore,” Percy said huffily, turning away.

Kingsley brought one massive hand down on his shoulder. “She’ll help you, kid. She’s in thick with Dumbledore.”

“And this was his idea?”

Kingsley shrugged noncommittally.

Percy folded his arms across his chest. “I don’t appreciate being manipulated, Kingsley.”

“Yeah, well, welcome to the side of good. It’s all vague pronouncements and half-baked prophecies and ask questions later. None of us are operating with full disclosure.”

“No wonder evil kicks your arse so often, then,” he said, as the kettle began to whistle.

*

Ginny was not, she had to confess, especially looking forward to their pre-term trip to Diagon Alley this year. In the past, she’d loved going shopping, loved the excitement of getting new things for school (even if ‘new’ in the Weasley family often meant second- or third-hand). But that was the past. This year everything was different and, as much as she might try to pretend otherwise, there was no changing it.

She dragged herself downstairs on Monday morning, puffy-eyed, caffeine-deprived and in an utterly wretched mood, to find Tonks and Professor Lupin sitting at the kitchen table.

“Well, good morning,” Tonks said with a laugh. “You look like you had a rough night of it.”

“Hardly,” Ginny said grumpily, pouring herself a glass of milk. “That would have implied that something interesting happened.”

Lupin shook his head in vague disapproval, but he was smiling.

“Bored, eh?” Tonks said. “Well, I suppose you’ll be glad to get out today, then.”

Ginny groaned and laid her head on the table.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no’,” Lupin said, spooning sugar into his tea.

“I hate the entire world,” Ginny said. “Why is there never any coffee?”

“Coffee is bad for you,” Hermione said primly, coming into the kitchen. “Studies have shown-“

“Stop! I don’t want to know.”

“Fine. Just go ahead and give yourself a stomach ulcer before you’re twenty.” Hermione sat next to her.

“Remind me,” Ginny said, with her head still against the tabletop. “Why are we friends?”

“I do your homework?” Hermione said, with just a flash of a grin.

Ginny smiled back. “Right, that must be it.”

“When are we leaving for Diagon Alley?” Hermione asked absently, pouring her own glass of milk.

“As soon as Ron and Harry are ready, which ought to be,” Tonks checked her watch, “about two weeks from never.”

“And they say teenage girls are bad,” Lupin said, without looking up from the newspaper.

“Harry’s probably just sulking in the bathroom,” Ginny said without thinking, a little surprised at the bitterness she heard in her own voice. “God only knows he isn’t doing anything about his hair.”

“Nice, Ginny,” came Ron’s voice from behind her.

Ginny felt herself flush slightly, but she recovered. Holding her head up, she turned to face both boys, who were standing in the doorway.

“What? Harry isn’t exactly a pomade-and-shine sort of guy.”

“That’s not the point and you know it...” Ron began, but Harry just shrugged and flung himself into a chair at the table.

To be fair, his hair was appalling. It looked like he’d tried to wet it down, but it had just dried into an even more impressive cowlick than usual. Ron, for his part, smelled suspiciously of aftershave. Maybe trying to pick up Harry’s slack in the hygiene department?

“Where’s Mum?” Ron said, spinning a chair around and folding his long legs up on either side.

“Your mother is off on an errand, only Tonks and I are going with you today,” said Lupin.

“Really?” Ginny sat up, suddenly energized. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

“Why is that?” Harry asked, sounding suspicious.

“Well, someone has to go with you, don’t they?” Tonks said, smiling.

That, apparently, was the wrong answer. Harry’s face darkened.

“What? We don’t get the full honor guard this time? Or have we figured that Voldemort isn’t quite as keen to kill me this year?”

“Harry…” Hermione began, but Ron stopped her with a slight shake of his head.

“Harry,” Lupin said flatly. “You can stay here, you know. No one’s forcing you to go.”

Harry didn’t respond, just folded his arms across his chest and looked sullen.

“Excellent,” Lupin said, clasping his hands together. “Now, if everyone’s ready.” He turned to Tonks. “Where did I put the…?”

“These things?” Tonks pulled three shiny silver pocket watches from a colorful satchel she had slung across one shoulder.

“Exactly. Thank you,” Lupin said, standing up and handing one to Hermione. Everyone got to their feet.

“Portkeys?” Harry was staring at the things with undisguised contempt.

“Yes, Harry,” Lupin said, sounding distinctly tired. “I’m afraid it’s the safest way-“

“Oh, sure. Much safer. Especially if you want to end up in a cemetery surrounded by Death Eaters and bleeding from the wrists.”

“You’d better partner up,” Tonks said, cheerfully ignoring him. “Ginny, why don’t you come with me? And Harry-“

Ginny expected Ron to volunteer immediately to go with Harry, but he didn’t. He hung back, standing beside Hermione and looking uncomfortable.

“Actually, Ginny, why don’t you go with Harry?” Lupin asked pleasantly, but with the unmistakable sense that it wasn’t really a request. Tonks gave him a sharp look, but Lupin ignored it.

“Sure. Fine,” Ginny said. A year ago -- hell, three months ago -- she wouldn’t have minded going with Harry at all. Two or three years ago, she would have been embarrassingly thrilled… but the less said about that, the better. These days, though, hanging out with Harry was about as much fun as listening to Percy talk about international magical cooperation. Actually, she reconsidered, hanging out with Percy was way more fun, at least lately. She glanced sidelong at Harry. It was a crazy mixed-up world.

Harry scowled at her.

 _Oh, for heaven’s sake_ , Ginny thought and went to stand next to him. Harry snatched the pocket watch from Lupin and then looked down, glaring at it and refusing to talk to anyone.

Tonks flipped her own watch open. “Just another minute or so. Everybody hang on,” she said as Lupin reached out to her and put his fingertips against the watch chain.

Harry was still glowering darkly at the portkey resting in his palm.

“Oh, don’t be such a big baby,” Ginny snapped, annoyed, taking the thing from him.

Harry made a grab to snatch it back. His hand just closed over it when Ginny felt that familiar sick-somersault that meant it had activated.

“Now, see, this isn’t so-" But she never finished. The next thing she knew, she felt as though she’d flipped over somehow, shifted slightly, like changing lanes in the car her dad had owned when she was little. Cold air was whistling past her ears, so loudly she thought her eardrums might burst, and then she slammed into something solid.

*

Having guests to tea at _Longbottom Lane_ was a common enough occurrence that the preparations ought to have been accomplished with little or no fuss. However…

There were a lot of ‘howevers’ in Neville’s life. He’d long since stopped keeping track of them.

“Neville, dear.” Gran was standing in the doorway of the music room, dressed in tweeds and carrying a large bunch of dahlias freshly-cut from the garden. “I’m going to need you out of the house this morning. We’re having guests to tea and there are a million things to be done. You know you’ll just get underfoot.”

Neville did indeed know this, thanks to years of experience. He nodded and sighed. “I’ll be out in the greenhouses then.”

“Very good, dear. Before you go, though, I need a word with you.”

“Uh-huh.” Neville just barely looked up from the piano.

“It’s about your friend Ginny Weasley.”

“What about Ginny?” he asked, still fingering the keys lightly.

“I like that girl,” Gran said, sitting next to him and putting a hand firmly over his to stop him playing. “She has spunk.”

“I suppose,” Neville said, not really listening.

“You could do worse, you know,” Gran continued, “and she clearly likes you.”

Neville had also long since stopped wondering how his Gran knew those sorts of details with alarming accuracy. “Ginny is not at all interested in me that way,” he said firmly. “She has a boyfriend, and even if she didn’t-"

“Yes, yes, dear. Of course,” Gran said with the slight sigh she used when she couldn’t be bothered to be truly passive-aggressive. “I bring her up, of course, because her brother is coming to tea.”

“Which brother?” Neville asked. “One of the older ones, I suppose?”

“Yes,” she replied. “Percy, as a matter of fact.”

“Oh, I can’t imagine that will go over well with Dumbledore, will it?”

“Nonsense.” She patted him on the shoulder. “Who do you think suggested it?”

Neville just sighed.

“You’d do well to show a little more interest in these things, Neville. After last year, I thought perhaps-

“Gran-" They’d been down this road a time or two already that summer.

“Dear boy…” She stood up and began to pace. “There are things- There are things that we are going to have to talk about eventually. You need to be involved. Yes, it’s definitely time,” she said, half to herself.

Neville shook his head. “Why bring all this up now?” he asked.

“This past year… you finally fought back.” Gran hesitated, not seeming to quite know what to say. Neville perked up. This was new. “I- I was proud of you, Neville. Your father would be proud of you.”

Neville placed his hands atop the piano, unable to find his voice for a full minute.

“Now get out of the house,” Gran said, turning her back abruptly and leaving.

Neville went, but it didn’t bother him nearly as much as it usually did.

*

“Oh, not _again_.” It was Harry’s voice and it was the first thing Ginny heard when she opened her eyes.

“Ow,” Ginny said, with feeling. She was lying on her back on the hard ground. She couldn’t see Harry, but she could hear him. It was very dark and the air was damp, as though they were underground. “Not what again?” she asked, running through the possibilities in her mind. A horrible one suddenly occurred to her. “Oh, God. It’s not another giant snake, is it?”

“Ginny? Is that you?”

“No, it’s the Queen bleeding Mother. Who do you think it is?” She tried to sit up, but came over dizzy about halfway there. “Oh, damn it.”

“Are you all right?” Somehow he’d found his way over to her in the dark, patting the floor next to her, then her shoulder, and fumbling toward- Oh, that definitely wasn’t her shoulder.

“Hey!” She jerked away sharply.

“Sorry,” Harry said, actually sounding truly sorry for the first time in weeks. “I didn’t mean to, uh-“

“Cop a feel? Nice to know.” She tried to sit again, actually making it this time.

“I’ve got my wand,” Harry began, “but I’m a little afraid to use it, what with last summer and all. I don’t know whether this qualifies as a life threatening situation or not -- though with my luck it probably does.” He hesitated. “Ginny, be caref-"

“Wait.” She rummaged around in her bag. “I have a lighter.”

“Should I even ask,” Harry said, “why you’re carrying around a cigarette lighter?”

“It’s probably better if you don’t.” She snapped it open and the flame sparked in her hand. She could see him now. He was standing less than a foot away from her, both hands braced against the wall. They were very definitely underground. Ginny remembered the last time she’d been trapped in an underground chamber with Harry. It wasn’t an experience she was in a particularly big hurry to relive.

“Well, that doesn’t help us much, does it?”

“Hey, at least we can see,” Ginny said. Now that she could see Harry – and now that she was reasonably sure there weren’t any giant mythical serpents about to emerge from hiding – she was remembering how annoyed she’d been with him earlier.

Except… Beneath the dark anger on his face, now there was something else, something that looked uncomfortably like fear. Harry was allowed to be a lot of things: insufferable, moody, reckless, sad, even a little broken. But Harry was never, never allowed to be scared. He just wasn’t made that way; the world wasn’t.

Somehow Ginny found herself standing a little closer to him. “Harry-"

"Shut up a minute, won't you?"

And the annoyance was back again. "Are you at least trying to find us a way out of here, if you're going to be rude?"

“I’m trying, all right!” he snapped. “You might try helping yourself, you know.”

She dusted herself off, and scowled at Harry. “Is there a particular reason you’re acting like a moody little shit today?”

Harry just scowled back more deeply. “Gee, I don’t know, Ginny. Do you think maybe it’s because of the megalomaniacal Dark Lord out to kill me? Or maybe the dead godfather? Or maybe the fact that we’re trapped in someone’s basement?!”

“Hey, don’t inflict your post-traumatic stress on the rest of us. We’re on your side, remember?”

“What exactly do you suggest I do, then?”

“Hmm, I don’t know,” she said sweetly. “Maybe you could try not being such massive wanker all the time.”

He blinked. “I honestly don’t get you.”

“I speak the truth. What’s not to get?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it again, clearly searching for a response to that. "Fine," he said at last. "Let's just focus on finding a way out of this place, okay?"

"Fine with me."

"Come on then. Let's get moving."

"And where exactly," she asked, holding the cigarette light up to get a better view of the place, "are we headed?"

"This way." He gestured vaguely to his right.

"And we know that's the way out because-?"

"We don't." Harry stomped off in that direction, stepping on her foot as he went.

“Ow!” Ginny said. He kept walking, and didn’t apologize. “ _Ow_ ,” she repeated, with emphasis. He didn’t even turn around. “Post-traumatic stress,” she grumbled, following after him. “More like post-traumatic hormones…”

They walked through a low corridor into a room that looked a whole lot like the one they'd just left.

“Harry, wait a minute. This isn’t a basement.” She shone the lighter into a corner. There were rows of bunk-style beds built into the stone wall. A small table in the corner was littered with an assortment of small glass boxes and dishes. Ginny leaned in and sniffed at one particularly ornamented dish, filled with ashes. “Yikes. Or maybe it’s just an evil basement.”

“What?”

“That,” she pointed at the dish, “is some very bad juju.”

Harry leaned in looked closely at the dish. “How do you know that? It looks like an ordinary knickknack to me.”

“Hey, remember? I know dark magic when I see it.”

“Unless it’s an evil, soul-sucking spirit trapped in a diary. Then? Not so much.”

“Hey!” she began hotly. She could feel her cheeks flush with anger. “What is your d-" But suddenly Harry knocked her out of the way. Hard. “For the fifth time today," she hissed. "Ow!”

She grabbed at her shoulder reflexively and was about to protest further, when he said, “Be quiet. Someone’s coming.”

Harry grabbed her by the sleeve and pushed her behind him, snapping the lighter shut against her hand and flattening them both against the wall to one side of the door. Voices were coming from the corridor they'd just come through, echoing weirdly off the wet, stone walls.

"So anyway I told him that if he didn't like it, he could just forget about-"

"Hush up a minute," a vaguely familiar voice said. "There's something off here. Do you smell smoke?"

"Of course I smell smoke," the first voice, a girl, said. "That's rather the point, isn't it?"

"Not _that_ kind of smoke. Regular smoke, like a match."

"A what?"

"Never mind."

A shadow fell across the doorway as someone played a lantern across the far wall. Harry tensed, pushing Ginny even farther back against the wall with his outstretched arm.

"Somebody's been here," the second voice said, and a tall figure strode into the room, setting the lantern onto a table in the center of the room and turning to look directly at Harry and Ginny.

It was Theodore Nott. He blinked once in disbelief. "What the-?"

“Is that Potter?” another voice said. “I don’t believe it.”

"What," Nott said, sitting down on the edge of the table, "possible reason could you have to be down here?"

Harry drew himself up to his full height, still effectively shielding Ginny from Nott and whoever else was in the room now. Ginny had no way of knowing, as she couldn't actually see over Harry's shoulder. She shoved him gently, but he just pushed back and hissed at her to stay put.

"We don't even know where here is," Harry said. "Is this some sort of ambush?"

"Ambush?" Nott actually looked amused. "Seriously?"

"Isn't that what you people do? Ambushes, plots, random acts of treachery and violence?"

For a half-second Nott looked like he might take offense, but instead he just said mildly, "Not during summer holiday."

"Even evil takes a holiday I guess," Harry retorted.

"Harry, cut it out." Ginny pushed him again, finally knocking him off-balance long enough to slip out from behind him.

"Don't listen to him. He's like that with everyone," she said brightly. "Every morning at breakfast, it's like, 'Hey, Harry? Pass the jam, won't you?' And all we get back is evil this, evil that. It gets rather tiresome, really."

Nott grinned at her. "Hullo, Weasley."

"Theo."

"How's your holiday been?"

"Absolutely wretched. The family is driving me crazy, Neville almost got us all killed last month, and then, of course, Harry and I got ourselves magicked into this basement."

He leaned back. "That does sound tiresome."

"Do you mean to tell me," Harry began slowly, catching on, "that you two know each other?"

"Passingly," Nott said. "We're not exchanging BFF bracelets or anything, but Weasley's all right."

Ginny just raised an eyebrow at him. Harry was turning an interesting shade of purple, so Ginny decided to explain. "We had Charms club together year before last, Harry. Theo's all right, too."

"And the rest of them?"

Ginny turned to follow Harry's gaze. About half of the Slytherins in Harry's year were standing, arms crossed and looking rather skeptical, against the far wall. Draco Malfoy, however, was notable by his absence.

"Them I can't vouch for."

"I can. Let's take this party into the main room," Nott said to the others. Turning back to Ginny, he said, "You, too. Come on."

They'd missed the main room on their way down the corridor with the lighter -- which was unfortunate because it had working lights, a radio and, incongruously, a small circle of red pleather beanbag chairs around a low table. The table was scorched and coated with a fine dusting of ash. There was a distinct smell of patchouli in the air. Pansy Parkinson flopped into one of the chairs, flicking the radio on listlessly and looking impossibly bored by them all. Millicent Bulstrode sat as well and began unpacking cans of lager, a bag of crisps and some very suspicious-smelling brownies from her satchel. Ginny had to stifle a giggle.

"This is what you do during the summer? That's so-" She giggled again. "That's so pedestrian!"

Standing behind her, Nott leaned down and said softly, "Disappointed that we aren't performing blood rites and stealing candy from small children?"

"A little bit. It takes away some of your mystique."

"I suppose you'll have to learn to appreciate me for other reasons, then-" he began, but was cut off by Harry clearing his throat meaningfully.

"Back to the matter at hand...?" Harry prompted.

"Which was?"

"Where we are, and why you brought us here!"

Nott pulled one of the beanbags out for Ginny, who sat. "I didn't bring you here. None of us did. How could we? No magic during holidays, remember?"

"Oh, Harry breaks that rule all the time," Ginny said, accepting the can of lager that Nott opened and handed to her. Harry scowled at her again.

"As for where we are," Nott continued, "we're underneath an old warehouse that my father owns. We come here to, you know-"

"Hang out?" Ginny offered helpfully.

"Is that what the kids are calling it these days?"

“So, it’s kind of a Junior Death Eater rave, then?” Harry said, still standing close enough to the door to make a quick escape if necessary.

“Not all Slytherins are Death Eaters in training, you know,” Nott said, looking vaguely offended. "There's no dark magic going on here -- unless you count Mill's brownies."

“But what about the-" Ginny gestured at a row of ceramic dishes lined up across a high shelf on one wall.

“We don't mess around with those. This place used to be an opium den, home to all sorts of nastiness, about a hundred years ago.” He shrugged. “My family owns the property, but we’ve never used it for anything in particular. Opium can be used for some different kinds of magic. Dark arts, mostly: divination, dreaming spells and the like.”

“And that’s what people used to do here?”

“Some of them. I think most people just liked the opium, actually.” He turned to Harry. "As for how you got here, I have no idea. I'd love to know, though. We've broken most of the wards so we can get in, but I wouldn't have thought it would work for anyone else."

Ginny shrugged, taking a sip of lager. "Our portkey malfunctioned, must have been a coincidence."

"I don't believe in coincidences," Harry said, finally putting his wand away and coming over to sit on one end of Ginny's beanbag.

“How boring,” Pansy said. Her gaze flicked up and down Ginny. “Nice shoes.”

Ginny turned helplessly to Harry. “I have no idea how to take that. Was that sarcasm?”

“Surprisingly enough?” Pansy said. “No. I like your shoes.”

“Uh, thanks?”

Pansy just shrugged.

Millicent wordlessly offered a beer to Harry, who shook his head. When he refused, she tossed it over to a skinny Slytherin boy Ginny didn't recognize. When she turned back, Nott was asking Harry about the broken portkey.

“You were both holding it?” he said, looking vaguely thoughtful. “And that’s how you ended up here? That _is_ interesting-"

"Why?" she asked.

"No real reason," he said. "Just Potter being, well, Potter. And you-"

"What about me?"

"Come on, Weasley. We know all about you, remember? Strangled any good chickens lately?"

Ginny frowned at him.

"Oh, don't be mad at me, Freckles," he said, smiling at her. She couldn't quite help smiling back. "That's never been a secret, and you know it."

"Dumbledore said no one had to know-" Harry began.

"But everyone did. Honestly, Potter."

Pansy leaned over to Ginny again. "I can't remember, who is your boyfriend?" The 'this week' was implied, but Ginny chose to ignore it.

"Dean Thomas."

"Oh, yes. He's rather handsome." She considered for a moment. "Maybe I should date a Gryffindor boy – for variety. The Slytherins are getting a bit stale. Theo's one of the only interesting ones of the bunch."

“I thought you liked Draco,” Ginny said.

Pansy shrugged eloquently. “I do like Draco,” she said, and promptly lost interest in the conversation.

"Come on, Ginny." Harry was getting to his feet. "We've got to go. Lupin will be frantic when he sees we're not with the others."

"No, he won't. I've never seen him frantic. I've never even seen him more than ever-so-slightly bemused."

Harry seemed to be fighting to suppress some sort of urge. Instead, he took her by the arm. "Let's go, Ginny. Your friend here is going to show us the way out. Apparently, this place is just off Knockturn Alley, so we didn't go too far from where we were supposed to end up."

"How convenient."

"Come on, Weasley," Nott said, taking her other arm. "I owe you one for the chicken crack."

*

Lupin and the others were waiting for them outside Gringotts.

"Harry!" he said, catching sight of them, "You're all right! I was about to owl Dumbledore. When you didn't come through with the rest of us, I was ready to think the worst."

“Yeah, well, we took a little side trip,” Harry said, with a warning look at Ginny.

“Didn’t wind up down Knockturn Alley again, did you?” Ron asked with a grin.

“Actually…” Ginny began. Harry gave her an extremely dirty look. She threw her hands up and walked away, muttering, “Whatever.”

Lupin had torn his gaze away from Harry and was looking at her curiously. "Ginny, are you all right, too?"

"Oh, fine. I'm great. Just fabu."

"I'll bet you are, _Freckles_ ," Harry said, half under his breath.

“Oh, screw this. I need a sink and a mirror.” She grimaced. “And some lotion wouldn’t kill me, either. You coming, Hermione?”

"Uh, sure," Hermione said.

The wizarding world had very few public restrooms. There was a reason for this. Talking mirrors, exploding toilet seats and lewd condom machines might seem like interesting conversation pieces, but it made for a bit of a harrowing experience in the public loo.

"So, what really happened to you two today?" Hermione asked, as Ginny was running a borrowed comb through her hair.

"I am honestly not sure. There were Slytherins and pot brownies and a malfunctioning portkey -- and I think Harry may have had a small stroke of some sort. But other than that? No earthly idea. Besides, Harry doesn't want me to tell."

Hermione opened her mouth to reply, but just then the condom machine made a very off-color remark

"Oh, that's filthy," Hermione said, trying very hard not to look amused.

Tonks and the boys were still waiting when they returned. Ron had gone and gotten everyone lemon ices in the meantime, prompting Ginny to declare him her favorite brother ever.

"What do you say we go look at the new Nimbus line?"

Hermione looked vaguely disappointed by this suggestion, so Ginny offered to go to Flourish and Blotts with her instead, so long as Hermione promised they could stop by Gladrags after.

“You’d rather look at shoes than brooms?” Ron said, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Where, exactly, is the law that says I can’t like both?” Ginny replied, more snappishly than she’d really meant. Great, now Harry was contagious.

"Why don't we split up?" Tonks suggested. "Boys and girls." She turned to Ginny and Hermione. "We can look at shoes and gossip and order frivolous drinks with umbrellas in them."

"I'm in," Ginny said. Hermione nodded her agreement.

As they waved goodbye, Ginny noticed Harry watching her leave with an odd expression on his face. She frowned at him, but he turned away and didn't look back again. So she resolved not to think about it for the rest of the day.

*  
It was very important to Percy to always repay his debts. He hated any kind of imbalance, hated the feeling that he owed anyone. Any debt was repaid promptly, with interest. This was why, he told himself the morning before his tea at the Longbottom estate, he packed a fairly elaborate boxed lunch and went round to Celia’s flat. She’d brought him breakfast, and so, it was only logical, he owed her lunch. Repayment, with interest.

She was quite pleased, and suggested that they flaunt their unemployed state by having lunch in a popular park near the Ministry of Magic. The park, like most of the magical spots in London, was hidden from non-magical eyes. To most people, it appeared to be a vaguely disreputable vacant lot. In truth, it was a pleasant little park favored by Ministry employees and primary school teachers. The weather was especially fine, so the park was very crowded.

Celia grinned as she spread a cornflower blue-and-lemon yellow beach blanket in the shade near a bed of daffodils. “This is a lovely spot. Shady, cool, and from here we can spit cherry pips at the Department of Magical Employment Services.”

Percy just shook his head. So far he had avoided mentioning his appointment with Mrs. Longbottom or Kingsley’s suggestion that he go into business for himself. He felt oddly guilty about that, but not enough to broach the subject.

Celia lay down beside him on the blanket, just a shade too close. Percy scooted away as inconspicuously as possible. She still noticed. She sighed, sat up and began to unpack the sandwiches and fruit.

“Tell me something, Percy.” She handed him a cucumber and watercress with the crusts cut off precisely.

“What’s that?”

“Did your mother hug you?”

Percy had been aiming his first bite of sandwich toward his mouth. The question caught him so off-guard that he missed and bits of cucumber and cream cheese went sailing over his shoulder.

“I’m sorry?”

“It’s a fairly simple question.” Celia spooned cold chicken salad onto a plate. “When you were a child, how often did your mother hug you? Every day? Once a week? All the time until you thought your ribs might shatter from the strain?”

“I- er, well, the latter, I suppose.”

“Really? How interesting,” she said and took a bite of salad.

“Whatever makes you say that?”

“You don’t act like a man whose family loves him, Percy. You don’t act like you were the sort of little boy whose mother hugged him and told him she was proud of him.” Another bite. “In fact, you act like someone who spent most of his childhood locked in a basement or on the wrong end of a belt buckle.”

She wasn’t looking at him. She was looking out across the park, watching a group of schoolchildren splash in an old marble fountain.

“That’s a terrible thing to say, Celia.”

“It is, isn’t it? It doesn’t stop it from being true, though.”

Percy put down the remnants of his sandwich and rubbed his temples. “I knew I should never have introduced you to Ginny.”

She turned, finally, to look at him. “That might well be true. Seeing your sister… Well, she wasn’t what I expected from your family after everything I’d heard.” She paused. “She loves you, Percy, terribly.”

He didn’t answer. She turned away, watching the children in the fountain again.

“I also imagine that she probably wants to take you over her knee and spank the life out of you on occasion, but that’s a sentiment I can certainly sympathize with.”

At that moment, Percy was incredibly glad that Celia wasn’t looking at him. For some reason, he had gone very, very red and no amount of lemonade seemed to be helping.

“Spanking?” he said helplessly, once he had regained some semblance of control.

“In the purely metaphorical sense, of course.”

“Of course.”

“Then again, you already do a lovely job of punishing yourself, so it would probably be a moot point anyway.”

“Now, really,” Percy said, beginning to feel very put out. “I made you a lovely lunch, I brought you to the park on what is possibly the last beautiful sunny afternoon of the summer, and all you can find to do is run through a litany of my flaws?”

Celia went a bit pink. “That wasn’t my intention, really. I just- I’m trying to figure you out, and every time I think I’ve made a bit of headway something pops up to make me think I’ve got you figured the entirely wrong way round.” She paused. “So, here’s your chance, Percy. Why don’t you tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

“What you want, where you’re coming from, why you’re so angry at yourself.”

He sighed heavily. “Angry? I suppose I am. I’ve tried to do everything the right way, but it somehow always ends up being wrong. After a while, Celia, that would make anyone angry… But I still don’t think I’m wrong, not about everything.” He shrugged. “My family would certainly be safer if they’d taken my advice.”

“Are you sure that’s the only reason you’re so angry with them?” Celia lay back, propping herself on one elbow and looking up at him.

“What other reason could there be?”

“Maybe you wanted to hurt them, just a little bit, for hurting you?”

Percy snorted. “That’s completely ridiculous. That wouldn’t even make any sense…”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I might do something like that, if I felt that my family had chosen someone else over me.”

“Chosen? Someone? What?” Percy said, nearly choking on his strawberry tart.

Celia reached up and absently patted him on the back. “Yes, Percy. You know what I’m talking about.”

He straightened up, taking a long drink of lemonade. “I’m quite certain I don’t.”

“What about Harry Potter, then? You’ve told me that your family considers him just like one of your brothers. When it came down to it, your family chose to side with Harry and not you. They chose one of your brothers over you, even if he isn’t a brother by blood-“

“That is ridiculous,” Percy snapped, trying not to think about the letter he’d sent Ron last year. Or all those letters and packages from his mother that he’d returned, unopened. He pushed those traitorous thoughts firmly to the back of his mind, and said, “Nevertheless, the choices they’ve made have put them in harm’s way. Not just from You-Know-Who and his followers, but from the Ministry, from others who disagree with Dumbledore. I thought – and I still think – that it was a very ill-advised choice.”

“Love isn’t logical, Percy.”

He looked up, a little startled. Celia was watching him with an expression that looked suspiciously like pity, mingled with… something else. He suddenly found it very hard to swallow.

“No kind of love is,” she amended with a slightly wry smile. “Not really. Trying to push it away, even if it is the smarter, better thing to do… it usually just doesn’t work. That’s equally true of families, friends and lovers.”

Percy shook his head. “Sometimes I think that you and I live in very different worlds.”

“The world’s the same,” she said bluntly. “It’s how we look at it that’s a little different.”

“So what would you have done, then?”

She sighed heavily. “I’m not sure. My family is very different from yours. We’re less-" She paused, seeming to choose her words carefully. “We’re less passionate. When we disagree – and we disagree quite often – it’s never personal. Then again, the things we disagree on aren’t as immediately dangerous as the situation your family is in.”

“That’s a very politic answer,” Percy said, a little unkindly.

It didn’t seem to bother Celia. She simply said, “And that is why I was very good at my job.” She put a hand on his wrist. “I do understand your side of it, though. Maybe even a little better than you do.” She wasn’t quite looking at him and for some reason that made it a little easier for him to listen to what she was saying. “You’re right about not all the dangerous people being necessarily on the side of, you know, pure evil. That’s what makes this so frightening, I think.”

“What’s that?”

“Aside from V-" She paled a little. “Well, you know. There are all these other forces at work. People with their own agendas, people who can be just as dangerous, for all that they’re not evil in the same way as, well, He is. And who’s going to deal with them while we’re all scanning the skies for any sign of the Dark Mark?”

Percy blinked. “Well, I don’t- Surely the Ministry…” He stuttered to a halt.

Celia smiled suddenly. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m ruining one of the last lovely days of the summer with all this.”

“No!” Percy said, surprised by the passion in his voice. “You’re absolutely right. We shouldn’t be ignoring those things, we shouldn’t be ignoring any of it. People need help, and right now there isn’t anyone to give it.”

He fell silent and could feel her watching him, though he didn’t want to turn his head to look.

“What is it?” she said, after a moment.

“Nothing,” he said, and then, moved by some compulsion he didn’t quite understand, he reached out and took her hand in his. “Just a decision I needed to make. But thank you.”

*

True to her word, after extended visits to both Flourish and Blotts and Gladrags, Tonks took them to a tiny corner cafe called the Bee's Bonnet and ordered three of the largest raspberry lemonades Ginny had ever seen.

"With pink umbrellas!" Tonks called after the waitress. "And two straws! Please!" She turned back to the table. "They have a Chocolate Lava Cake here that is as big as my head."

"After the day I have had," Ginny said, "that sounds just about right."

A bell tinkled above the door, signaling that new customers had just come in. Two witches who looked about Percy's age had walked in and were looking around, trying to decide on the best table. Both, Ginny noticed, were wearing outfits that came straight out of the pages of _Witch Weekly_ \-- and her wildest dreams.

"Is that a Mandarin Azure dragonhide handbag?" she said, trying not to stare. Much.

She did not expect the two witches to point directly at their table and suddenly start screaming. Ginny barely resisted the urge to duck underneath the tablecloth. Hermione upset her lemonade, but recovered quickly, steadying the glass before it did much beyond slopping onto the mother of pearl-handled cocktail forks.

"What have I done?" Ginny asked, slightly stunned.

The two girls screamed again. “Dora!” they said, and launched themselves at Tonks.

“Stop that!” Tonks said, her voice muffled slightly by the giant group-hug. “It’s Tonks, already. I’m an Auror now.”

“Oh, did you hear that?” said the brunette, releasing a blushing Tonks. “It’s ‘Tonks’ now, Belinda.”

“Much, much scarier than Nymphadora,” the blonde agreed, looking supremely amused. “I’m quite intimidated.”

"I haven't seen either of you in months. Sit," Tonks said. “Ginny, Hermione. This is Lux O’Flaherty and Belinda Ridgeway -- friends of mine from school. Hermione and Ginny are,” she hesitated a little, "family friends."

"Aren't you both just lovely!" the brunette said, and the two sat and ordered a small pot of earl grey tea.

"You must tell us all about your exciting cases," Belinda, the blonde, said once they'd poured.

"Yesterday I interrogated a two hundred year old warlock about his fire-breathing chickens," Tonks replied dryly. "It's hardly a detective novel."

"No one ever thinks their job is as interesting as other people do," Belinda said with a smile.

“Belinda is the most wonderful chef,” Tonks said.

"Oh, how much fun! You must love it."

"See?" Belinda shook her head.

“And what do you do?” Hermione asked, turning to Lux.

“Oh, you know,” Lux said, waving a hand as if it didn’t matter much. “A bit of this, a bit of that. Charities mostly.”

“I see.”

"You know, Ginny," Tonks said, quickly changing the subject, "we were all at school with your brothers."

"Oh, really? Which ones?"

"Charlie," Tonks said, "and Percy -- though I didn't know him very well."

"Oh, you're a Weasley!" Lux said. "Such lovely boys."

“You always fancied Percy a bit, didn’t you?” Belinda said mildly.

Lux wrinkled her nose. “Yes, until he took up with that horrible drab, Penny Clearwater.”

Tonks laughed. “I’m surprised you didn’t just steal him.”

“She would have done,” Belinda said, taking a sip of tea, “if he hadn’t shown such poor taste in women to begin with. After that, I’m afraid he was tainted.”

“One has to draw the line somewhere,” Lux said, picking up her own cup. “I can forgive a lot for good looks and intelligence, but inherent bad taste is another matter altogether.”

“I don’t know,” Ginny said before she could stop herself, feeling slightly annoyed on Percy's behalf. “His new girlfriend seems quite nice to me.”

Hermione turned to stare at her, open-mouthed, and Tonks raised an eyebrow.

"Percy has a new girlfriend?" she said. "One you've met?"

Ginny ignored the last part and said, “Yes... Celia- I think her last name is Wilson? Williams?”

“Celia Williams?” Belinda said, raising an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Another Ravenclaw,” Lux said. “How typical.”

“She was Head Girl, if I remember right,” Belinda continued. “I had an absolute terror of her when I was a third year. A bit haughty, as I recall, but certainly not without good reason. She was definitely on the A-list before Fudge got the sack. I’m impressed.”

“She’s an improvement over Penny Clearwater, at any rate,” Lux said, and even Tonks had to hide a bit of a smile.

But after a moment, she said, “There’s nothing wrong with Penelope Clearwater, Lux."

"If you say so. I hear she's finally had something done about that hair, so perhaps..." She shook her head. "What I would rather know about, Dora, is this new man you've been spotted with. Everyone is talking."

"You mean Kingsley?"

“Oh, yes. Kingsley Shacklebolt.” Lux grinned. “Lovely.”

Tonks went slightly pink and Ginny felt unaccountably annoyed with her.

“He’s a bit older…” Tonks began, and Belinda snorted.

“He’s what? Thirty at the most? That’s nothing.”

“A pittance,” Lux agreed, grinning.

Somewhere in the midst of all this, Ginny had managed to order the Chocolate Lava Cake. The cake was, true to its name, a volcano-shaped confection with melted chocolate bubbling up from a crater in the middle. All conversation stopped for a while once it arrived -- with five forks. And it was a good thing -- it took all of them to finish it.

After they finished up, they walked back toward Gringotts, Tonks waving goodbye to her friends as they went.

“They remind me of Parvati and Lavender,” Hermione said softly, with a slightly sour look on her face.

Ginny, who liked both Lavender and Parvati, didn’t reply.

"All right, girls," Tonks said, linking arms with them both. "Let's get the fellows and go home."

*

Despite all his better judgment, Percy went to tea.

It was Celia’s influence – and Kingsley’s. Possibly Ginny’s, as well. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good news for his continued health.

“Mr. Weasley,” Adelaide Longbottom grabbed his hand in an alarmingly firm grip and shook it decisively, before leading him into an expensively-but-unfortunately decorated parlor.

A thin, pale girl sat in an overstuffed chair, pouring out the tea from a silver tea service that looked like a remnant of the worst possible taste of the Victorian era.

“This is Luna Lovegood,” Mrs. Longbottom smiled. “She happened by just in time for tea.”

“How nice,” Percy replied, taking the seat he was offered.

“And, of course, you know Mr. Shacklebolt and my nephew.”

“Yes. Hello again, Neville. Kingsley.”

“Hey, Percy,” Kingsley said, holding out a silver platter. “Poppyseed scone?”

“Neville, for heaven’s sake, don’t fidget so,” Mrs. Longbottom said, taking her own seat and unfolding her napkin gracefully. Neville looked heavenward as though asking for strength.

“Sugar?” Luna asked from the chair to his left.

Percy turned toward her, noticing that she was wearing an elaborate, green cloche with a peacock feather perched jauntily over one ear. She held out the silver tea service to him, and he felt vaguely like Alice facing down the Mad Hatter.

“Uh, one sugar is fine.”

“Here you are,” she smiled at him, handing him a delicate china cup.

“So, Mr. Weasley,” Mrs. Longbottom began, “Kingsley here tells me that you want to go into business.”

“Yes, ma’am. Or… something like that, anyway.”

“And he’s found premises for you?”

“Yes.” Percy took a hesitant sip of tea.

“Well.” Mrs. Longbottom took a drink of her own tea. “I suppose everything’s in order then. I’ll have the papers drawn up and the money will be deposited in your account by Wednesday.”

Percy let his cup fall to the table with a decided clink. “That’s it?”

“That’s it,” she confirmed. “The only question, my boy, was whether you really wanted to do this -- and you proved that you did by showing up. As far I’m concerned, the matter is entirely settled.”

“Well, I suppose… what I mean is-" Percy was completely at a loss for words.

From his right, Kingsley clapped him on the shoulder. “Just enjoy it, kid. This is guaranteed to be the easiest part.”

“No doubt,” said Mrs. Longbottom, picking up a tiny silver bell and ringing it. “Fetch the raspberry cordial, won’t you, Mr. Bracegirdle?” she said to the tiny house elf who appeared. “We’re about to have a little toast.”

Mr. Bracegirdle returned after a moment, carrying cordial glasses and a tiny stoppered bottle on a silver tray.

Percy turned then to see Kingsley watching Neville with an odd expression on his face.

“What is it?” Percy asked.

Kingsley shook his head. “It’s- It’s nothing, at least nothing I can talk about.

He moved aside and let the house elf pour him a glass of cordial. Once everyone had been served, Mrs. Longbottom lifted her glass.

“To Mr. Weasley, and the beginning of what I believe will be a very beneficial partnership.”

*

As soon as they got back from Diagon Alley, Ginny hit the showers. In truth, she hit the giant clawfoot bathtub in the second floor master bath. She spent a good forty-five minutes soaking in water steaming with orange oil and vanilla, and scrubbing the basement grit out of her hair.

Afterward, she wandered downstairs in her robe to find Hermione in the kitchen, stirring something on the stove.

“If that is hot chocolate, I will totally be your best friend.”

Hermione shook her head and smiled. “It is hot chocolate, actually. Do you want marshmallows?”

“No thanks.” Ginny got two large mugs down from the hutch and set them on the counter. “It has been a very, very weird day – even for us, which is totally saying something.” She flopped into a nearby chair. “I wound up in yet another underground den of evil with Harry -- and Harry is completely irrational right now, by the way -- and Pansy Parkinson likes my shoes.”

Hermione turned from stirring the chocolate and goggled at her, speechlessly, for what had to be the second or third time that day.

“Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Ginny said.

"I thought you were going to tell me earlier, but-"

Ginny giggled. "The condom machine."

"That was very bad of us to laugh." But Hermione was still smiling.

"People who can't laugh at sex are doomed never to enjoy it," Ginny said, still snickering a bit.

"You say that as though-" Hermione began, but cut off as the kitchen door swung open.

“Ooo!” Tonks said, coming into the room. “Is that hot chocolate?”

Hermione sighed slightly and got out another mug.

“So,” Tonks sat at down at the table across from Ginny. “Are you ready to talk about whatever happened to you and Harry today?”

Ginny shrugged. “It’s not my thing, and Harry doesn’t want anyone else to know.”

“Um, okay,” Tonks said, looking askance at her but not pushing the issue. “So, what did you two think of Belinda and Lux?”

“They aren’t really the sort of people I imagined you being friends with at school,” Hermione admitted, handing Tonks a mug of chocolate.

Tonks smiled slightly. “Good people come in all different types, Hermione. So do good friends. If you're lucky, you figure that out early on.”

“They just seemed a bit silly, is all.”

“The world needs a bit more silliness, as far as I’m concerned. I’m fairly silly myself.”

“But,” Hermione hesitated, pouring her own hot chocolate and sitting down, “you aren’t silly like that.”

“Like what?” Tonks said mildly, slightly raising one eyebrow, and Ginny was put powerfully in mind of Professor Lupin.

“Well, you know…” Hermione seemed slightly discomfited. “About boys and clothes and- and frippery!”

Tonks raised her mug to hide a grin, and Ginny asked, “What’s a frippery?”

“Oh, never mind!” Hermione turned her head aside, and Ginny could see that she was blushing.

“I like boys and clothes and things,” Ginny said seriously, “and I don’t think I’m silly.”

“You’re most definitely not silly,” Tonks replied, equally seriously.

“Oh, just forget I said anything. Please!” Hermione said.

"No," Ginny said, thinking suddenly of Theo Nott and Harry's reaction to him, "I don't think we ought to forget it. We go through school thinking that we know exactly what this group, or this House, or this type of person is like. But, then, once you actually spend time with someone... Well, sometimes they turn out not to be like that at all."

"And sometimes," Hermione said flatly, "they turn out to be exactly the way you expected."

"Sometimes," Tonks said, and didn't push the matter any further. Ginny had the sense, though, that the point had been made.

"Hey, Hermione?" Ron pushed the kitchen door open, breaking the moment. "Could you come here for a minute? I have to talk to you about, uh, that thing? Remember that thing we were talking about earlier?"

"Oh! Oh, yes," she said, setting her mug in the sink and following him out. "That thing."

"They are so weird," Ginny said as the door swung shut again.

"Strange attractors." Tonks smiled. "That's how it goes sometimes."

"Like-" You and Kingsley? she thought, but instead said, "Like your friend Lux and Percy?"

"That would definitely have been strange. Speaking of Percy, though, Kingsley is off somewhere with him today. They said something about picking out Percy’s new office.”

“What’s this now?” Ginny asked.

“I’m not sure whether he wanted anyone to know…” she trailed off. “But considering that you seem to know a lot more about your brother’s business than I’d realized, I guess it can’t hurt. Percy, apparently, is opening up his own business -- sort of an Auror-for-hire thing.”

“Like a private investigator?”

“Something like that.”

“Percy Weasley, P.I.?” Ginny shook her head. “Nope, can’t see it. What on earth is he thinking?”

“Kingsley seemed to think it was a good idea.”

Both of them thought about that for a long moment.

“Well,” Ginny said at last, “if Kingsley thinks it’s a good idea, I suppose there must be something to it…”

Tonks laughed. “That’s what I said!”

“So…” Ginny said casually. “You and Kingsley? Really?”

“Yeah.” A pause. “Does that bother you?”

“No!” Ginny said, quickly. “Not at all.”

“I know you’re friends, is all-“

“You’re my friend, too,” Ginny said, and decided not to think about it anymore.

*

Her resolve lasted all of about two hours. After dinner, she went up to Harry's room to try and talk him into telling Professor Lupin about their adventure underneath Knockturn Alley. She considered just walking in without knocking, but decided that could potentially be awkward.

“What do you want?” Harry said from inside the room when she did knock

“Duh. I’m here for an apology.” She pushed open the door, crossed her arms and leaned against the door, expectantly.

Harry sighed and sat up on the bed, looking defeated. "And I'm supposed to be apologize for what exactly? Rescuing us from the bowels of an opium den?"

Ginny rolled her eyes. "It was a disused basement that used to be an opium den. That's a totally different thing." She sat down on the edge of the bed. “Harry, you should tell Professor Lupin what happened today. He’s worried. He keeps looking at me like he wants to ask, but is too afraid of upsetting you. This getting back at everyone for keeping things from you by keeping things from them? That’s just stupid, Harry. Nobody wins.”

“Maybe it makes me feel better,” Harry grumped.

“I’m sure that will be terribly comforting when the next person kicks it because none of us are talking to each other,” she said, coolly.

Harry flushed with anger, but didn’t say anything right away. Finally, he said, “You keep secrets, too, Ginny. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ginny replied, suddenly afraid that somehow Harry had found out about Percy. That was the very last thing she needed. He would know soon enough anyway because of her slip in front of Hermione that afternoon.

Harry just snorted in disbelief and said, “Oh, really? Does Dean know how you’ve been following Kingsley around all summer?”

“My friendship with Kingsley is far more complicated than you obviously think it is.” Ginny folded her arms across her chest. “And, besides, it’s not even remotely your business.”

"Oh, really? Like the fact that you've gone and gotten cozy with all the Slytherins isn't my business? They're the enemy, Ginny. You ought to know better."

“You-" She sputtered, searching for something foul enough to call him. “You idiot.” _Oh, yes. Perfect. That was a snappy comeback._ "As if you didn't have enough enemies, you go inventing more for yourself! You know what, Harry? Sometimes you really suck."

They glared at each other for few moments, before Ginny said, "I'm serious, Harry. Don't go creating trouble where there isn't any just because you're angry. Be angry. Yell at me if you need to, but I'm not your enemy. Neither is Theo, and Professor Lupin certainly isn't."

Harry looked down at the bedspread and didn't meet her eyes as he said, “You called me an idiot.”

She laughed suddenly. “Yes, I did.” She moved over and sat a little closer to him on the bed. “I’m sorry, Harry. Truce?”

He nodded. “I don’t mean to- well, to say some of the stuff I say. Ever since Sirius… and everything… it just comes out and I can’t stop it.”

“I do understand. It’s just that it doesn’t make you particularly easy to live with -- and we do have to live with you, Harry. All of us. You aren’t the only one with hurt feelings. You aren’t the only one who’s had bad things happen to you.”

"You keep reminding me," he said, with the slightest of sighs.

"Only because it's true," she replied. "Promise you'll talk to Lupin about the portkey?"

“That was weird,” he said. “I wondered if maybe-“

“If what, Harry?”

“Nothing,” he said, shaking his head suddenly. “It was stupid. Forget I said anything. I'll talk to Lupin in the morning. I promise.”

"All right," she said, standing up. "Good night, Harry."

*

The morning of September 1st dawned muggy and overcast. Percy woke up early and met with the agent to sign the lease on his new premises. Key in hand, he sat behind his new desk, made a pot of tea and conjured up a set of business cards. He wasn't entirely sure whether this was the most foolhardy thing he'd ever done, but it certainly ranked in the top ten.

It also made him feel glad to be alive.

At ten, he closed up shop and headed over to Kings Cross to skulk behind the pillars on Platform 9 3/4. It wasn't simple general purpose skulking (though he had a feeling he needed to start practicing that). This skulking had a specific and very clear purpose. He watched, from his vantage point beside a poster advertising headache powder, as his parents, Ron, Hermione, Harry and Remus Lupin rushed past. Bringing up the rear, as usual, was Ginny, struggling with an oversized hat box and an impractical turquoise handbag that looked as though it was made out of imitation dragonhide. She tripped and the hatbox went rolling. Percy stepped out from behind his pillar and caught it, handing it back to her.

"Percy!" she said, "I'm surprised to see you here. Tonks said you were off fighting crime."

“How on earth does Nymphadora Tonks know about that?" he said, then shook his head. "Never mind. I just... came to give you this.” He handed her a spare key to the office and his new business card. “You can use the key if you like. You don’t have to but-“

Ginny was reading the card. "So, you really are a detective? Like in books?" She grinned suddenly. "That's wicked, Percy."

"Go on," he said, "before Mum and Dad miss you."

She turned to go, tucking the card and key into her ridiculous purse. Then, abruptly, she turned back, flinging her arms around him in an embrace and smacking him right in the small of the back with her hatbox.

"I'll see you soon, Percy," she said, and ran off toward the train.

Percy watched until the train pulled out of the station. He could see his mother and Lupin waving after it, but his father was nowhere to be seen. Percy turned to go as the cars whizzed by. He threaded his way through the crowd of waving parents toward the barrier. He stopped short, though, as he caught site of a familiar figure standing practically in the middle of Percy's path. He looked away. If he could just make it to the barrier, he could slip through without being seen. But, it was too late. They made eye contact as he looked back again, his father swallowing a slight gasp.

“Dad,” Percy said, deciding to take the initiative.

“Percy.”

His father moved to walk away, but Percy took a step forward and said, “Dad…”

“Yes?”

“I- It’s good to see you looking well. I know you were hurt-"

“I’m much better now, Percy. But thank you for being concerned.”

They nodded at one another once and then went their separate ways.


	6. Found Things

Percy's first official client as a private... well, whatever he was... was a mysterious blonde, straight from the pages of some cheap detective novel.

His offices were small, but clean and well-appointed. The door sported a tasteful bronze plaque -- clearly Mrs. Longbottom’s doing -- that read ‘Weasley Consulting’ in understated script. The front room had two second-hand (but not shabby) sofas in the waiting area and an empty desk where a more profitable company would have had an assistant waiting to answer letters and make tea. Things weren't actually dire where profits were concerned, though. He made ends meet, if only just, thanks to the case work Kingsley sent his way. It was mostly grunt duty, the sort of minor investigation the Aurors had neither the manpower nor inclination to do themselves. Percy suspected that the thrill-seeking sort generally attracted to life as an Auror would be ill-suited to the painstaking data mining and clinical dissection of trivial facts the work required.

Percy, on the other hand, was fantastic at it.

That being said, though, he had yet to drum up a private, paying client of his own.

"Hello?" a voice said from the waiting area. "Is there anyone here?"

Percy did not, however, get his hopes up at this. The last time someone had accidentally wandered in, they'd actually been looking for the Chinese take-away restaurant downstairs.

The door to his office opened, revealing a slim, cool blonde, dressed in black, her pale hair falling over one eye. She looked up and asked for him by name.

He stood up from behind his desk motioned her forward. She was too far away for him to make out distinct facial features, but he had an impression of shiny hair and a set of very nice legs.

"I'm Percy Weasley," he said, coming around the front of the desk and extending a hand. "What can I do for you?"

"I need your help," she said, crossing the distance between them and shaking his hand.

As soon as she spoke again, of course, he recognized her -- she was a schoolmate of Ginny's, which meant she couldn't be more than fifteen, and, he realized abruptly, there was a special section of hell reserved for guys like him.

“You’re Lucy, aren’t you?" he managed, feeling very foolish. "Neville Longbottom’s friend?”

“Luna, and yes.” She was wandering the office, looking somewhat bemused. Like Ginny, he noticed, she seemed to prefer shopping for her clothes at Muggle thrift shops and consignment stores. However, where Ginny tended to prefer last season's designer ready-to-wear and cast-offs from the Seattle rock scene, Luna's clothes were about sixty years out of fashion. Silhouetted as she was in the pale sunlight coming from behind his Venetian blinds, the effect was somewhat unsettling.

“Shouldn’t you be in school?” he asked. Then, gesturing toward the tea kettle, "Cup of tea?"

"Oh, yes. Lemon, no sugar, please," she said, followed by, “Hogwarts is closed. Don’t you read the papers?”

The truth of the matter was, Percy couldn’t afford a subscription to The Daily Prophet, so he just offered a noncommittal shrug and said, “Closed? You can’t be serious...?” He handed her the cup of tea and bent to pour one for himself.

"I would never joke about something like that," she said soberly. "Would you?" She stared intently at him for a moment, before Percy coughed politely and looked away, taking a sip from his teacup.

“How did you find me anyway? I haven’t exactly gotten around to advertising this place.”

“Your sister told me where you were and what you do.” She paused, watching him again with those very distracting eyes. “I’d like to hire you.”

“Hire me? Whatever for?”

“I need you to find a prophecy for me.”

*

If Ginny had harbored any illusions that school was going to be in any way better than the preceding summer, they were dashed by the third week of the term -- which was, coincidentally, also the week that a score of masked men crept into the school in the dead of night and, apparently, spirited Dumbledore away. McGonagall had sent them all home the very next day, not looking at all happy about the decision. Harry, though, maintained that this was all part of Dumbledore’s master plan and that he would return to save the day – but only when the time was right. Ginny wasn’t sure if this meant that Harry was privy to some plan the rest of them weren’t, or just that he’d really, truly, finally lost it.

Hermione had gone home to her parents, and Ron, to Ginny's ever-increasing suspicion, had actually gone with her. The adults (including both Tonks and Kingsley) had hardly even been around since she returned home, running to and fro on mysterious errands, and leaving Ginny all but alone in the house with Harry.

Fan-freaking-tastic.

Though, to be fair, she had to give Harry some credit. She'd fully expected that the events of the past few weeks would have pushed him further into his particular (and LOUD) version of teen angst. In reality, he was actually dealing with it fairly well – or, at least, as well as outright denial could go. His angry outbursts and depression had been replaced by a kind of cold resolve that, while not any more comforting than the alternative, was at least quieter and slightly more polite.

She’d tried to avoid him at first, to give him some space, only to find it was nearly impossible. He always seemed to be there, hovering just out of reach, looking at her like he wanted to ask a question only to turn away when she noticed.

In the absence of any other evidence, she simply decided her first instincts were right and Harry had finally completely lost the plot.

It turned out, of course, that the real issue was a bit more complicated than that. They’d been home about a week and a half (and how terrifying was it that she’d started to think of 12 Grimmauld Place as ‘home’?), when she went upstairs to find Professor Lupin for her mother, and he’d been uncharacteristically hard to locate. Finally, after going all the way up to the attic door, she found out why: he was holed up in the attic loft with Harry.

Ginny hadn’t meant to eavesdrop, exactly, but as she started back down the steps toward the landing, she heard her own name. She stopped short, only able to hear snatches of the conversation.

“…there’s something to it, though. We’re both a little… contaminated, I think.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Harry,” Lupin said, sounding vaguely alarmed.

“I don’t think it’s ridiculous,” he said, sounding uncharacteristically thoughtful. “I actually think it explains a lot.”

They’d started down the stairs then, and Ginny had hurried to her room and shut the door until they’d passed safely by.

After a few more days went by and Harry continued to hover, Ginny had finally had enough. She caught him one afternoon in the kitchen, spoiling his dinner by stealing the last of the molasses cookies.

“Those are my favorites, you know,” she said, crossing her arms and blocking the door to the stairs. “You could at least leave me one.”

Looking a little sheepish, Harry put one of the cookies back in the jar. “Gin-” he began, then stopped, shaking his head.

“What is it, Harry? You want something, or you want to tell me something or… something. You’ve been lurking around ever since we got back.”

Harry frowned. “I don’t lurk.”

“Skulk?”

“I don’t do that either,” he said grumpily.

“Well?”

"I-" he began. “I wondered… I’ve been wondering…”

“Seriously, Harry? Spit it out.”

“Well, you know, we’ve both sort of been touched by Voldemort-"

“First of all, ew – don’t say it quite like that, okay? Like we’re supposed to point to the place on the doll where he got his dark magic on us… And, second, I hate that name. I get why you say it – it’s brave and all – but I hate it. I just have to go on record with that.”

Harry sighed heavily, more color in his face than Ginny had seen in months. “Ginny,” he said, “do me a favor? Shut up for five consecutive minutes at a minimum, okay?”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine.”

“So we’ve both been t- affected by Voldemort, and I’m wondering if maybe that means something, something important...”

“Oh, Harry. That's not how things work.”

“Since when? That's exactly how things work. People keep talking to me about destiny and fate like that's a perfectly normal way to plan my life.” He frowned darkly at her. “There has to be a reason for all this, or it's just too horrible to be real.”

“Okay,” she said. “Maybe that is true, but it doesn't have anything to do with me.”

“Or maybe it has everything to do with you,” he said, with this look on his face that she felt certain she'd seen there before. She had a violent flash of memory: Harry and Tom in the cold and the dark, the drip of water on the stone floor. She remembered that feeling of being disconnected, of being a spectator in her own body.

She didn't want this, she didn't even want to think about this. She wanted, she realized with a start, to see Percy. Back then, he'd been the only one to even notice anything wrong with her. He'd gotten it all wrong and completely loused it up, of course, but at least he'd noticed. Swallowing a sudden lump in her throat, she wondered exactly when she’d started to rely on him again.

She waited until after dinner to make her escape through the mostly-forgotten side door that lead up from the kitchen – stopping to steal that last cookie as she went.

"Where are you off to?" someone said from the vague darkness of the kitchen.

Ginny jumped nearly a foot in the air. "What?!"

"I said," Harry repeated, leaning forward, out of the shadows, "where are you going?"

“Wow, so this is you not lurking,” she grumbled, then said, "I'm, um, just going out for a little while."

"Where? Are you seeing Dean? Kingsley?" He paused for dramatic effect. "Percy?"

Busted. She was going to kill Hermione.

"What would make you suggest that?"

"Don't play dumb, Gin. You're terrible at it."

Ginny blinked. "No, I'm not."

Harry ignored her, getting up from his chair and totally invading her personal space. “So I think we both know what’s about to happen here.”

“Trust me,” Ginny said, trying to take a step back only to find she was blocked in by the long kitchen table, “when I tell you that I really don’t know…”

"I'm coming with you, of course," he said and backed off a little.

The 'or else' was implied, but she called him on it anyway. "Or what?"

"Or I tell your parents what you're up to." He shrugged.

"Oh, of course. Okay, fine, _Hermione_."

He made a face at her, but grabbed his jacket off the hook near the side door, anyway.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" He shoved her gently toward the door.

"Percy's not going to be happy to see you..." she began.

"He'll get over it," Harry said, and shut the door firmly behind them.

*

There were shadows behind the smoked glass door to Percy’s office. Ginny frowned, one hand poised to knock, and looked over her shoulder at Harry.

"Not like that, you silly girl," Percy was saying from inside.

A soft female voice replied, but not loudly enough for Ginny to distinguish any of the words.

She knocked once, softly, then again more sharply. When there was no reply, she looked at Harry, who just shrugged.

“Well, we know he’s in there, anyway.”

She opened the door to find Percy suspended from the ceiling by an elaborate system of climbing ropes. He was dressed all in black, as was Luna Lovegood, who was standing on tiptoe, reattaching a hook to the back of Percy’s black leather jumpsuit.

“Ah,” Harry said from above her left shoulder. “I suppose it goes without saying that this is a bad time?”

"This could not possibly get any weirder." Ginny took a step back and bumped into the suddenly reassuring bulk of Harry’s chest (which, considering this was Harry, wasn’t especially bulky, or usually especially reassuring).

"I said it before," a voice said from the back room, "and I have to say it again. This is a terrible, terrible idea."

The door swung open and Neville, also dressed in black leather, came into the reception area.

"Oh, I spoke too soon," Ginny said, this time stepping away from Harry and sitting down on a nearby sofa. "It can get much, much weirder."

"Apparently," Harry said softly, sitting down himself on the arm of the sofa.

Percy reached up and unfastened himself from the cables, falling to the floor with a distinct thud.

“This is not,” he said, sitting up and attempting to straighten his glasses, “what it looks like.”

“Really? Because it looks like you’re all about to do some cat burglar-ing…”

“Oh, we are,” Luna said, apparently unconcerned.

“You’re going to have to start at the beginning,” Ginny said. “Speak slowly and don’t leave anything out.” She paused, considering. “Unless it’s anything that might require me to bleach my brain afterward…”

“Honestly, Ginny,” Percy said. “That’s rather melodramatic, don’t you think?”

Harry gave him a look of undisguised loathing that gave her a jolt. She’d managed to forget somehow over the last few months how much really bad blood there still was between Percy and the rest of the family, Harry included.

“I don’t think so,” she continued, pretending she hadn’t noticed. “I’m not the one dressed like the Pink Panther, am I?”

“The Pink Panther was the diamond,” Harry muttered. “Not the jewel thief – and how do you even know about that, anyway?”

“I hired Percy,” Luna interrupted. “Neville and I need someone to help us find something.”

“What exactly?”

“Something rather important,” Luna replied, and Ginny suspected that she was, for once, being intentionally vague and incomprehensible. A meaningful look passed between her and Neville that made it clear they weren’t telling the whole story.

Percy, though, was apparently not in on the conspiracy, because he said, “It’s a prophecy, housed at the Ministry of Magic. Apparently, it says something about Neville here…” He trailed off, noticing that Luna and Neville both suddenly looked very shifty.

“You wouldn’t!” Ginny said, staring at the pair of them. “After what happened last time? And you didn’t even bother to tell Percy what it was? Do you want to get yourselves killed?”

“But it’s entirely different this time…” Neville began, two spots of bright pink burning on his cheeks. “That’s the whole point, and the reason we didn’t want to tell Harry.”

“And you didn’t tell Percy because…?”

“Because we don’t know what it says yet,” Luna said, as though this was the most obvious thing in the world. “How could we know whether to trust him with it when we don’t even know what it says? We just know that it’s important, and that the Death Eaters wanted it…”

“Wait just one minute!” Percy cut in hotly. “You were about to send me after something that a bunch of Death Eaters are looking for?”

“More like something they’ve already tried to steal! I can’t believe you two would do this.”

“Wait,” Percy said, realization dawning on his face. “This was it – the thing – that You-Know-Who broke into the Ministry to steal last summer…”

Harry had remained rather worryingly silent throughout the whole exchange. He looked up, catching Neville in his gaze. Neville went even redder than he already was.

“Harry-"

“So you’re going to steal the prophecy, the one we already stole…” Harry frowned darkly, a look Ginny recognized as the first sign of an impending meltdown.

“But I thought it was destroyed…” Ginny said, quickly, hoping that it was true.

“That was only a copy. Clearly, they must have made another.”

“They made a copy?” Harry said, looking incredulous. “How blindingly stupid are they? Maybe next they’ll just put up a nice sign that says, ‘Hey, Voldemort! Come and get it!’”

“Well,” Percy said, straightening his collar fussily, “Ministry Decree #5278 clearly states that all known prophecies must be properly registered and a copy kept at all times in the Hall of Prophecy…” He trailed off. “What?”

Ginny shook her head. “I just remembered why I wasn’t speaking to you for the better part of a year. You’re a prat.”

“Nevertheless,” he continued smoothly. “I think it’s quite unlikely that another attempt will be made to steal it – at least not by Death Eaters,” he conceded. “They had surprise on their side last summer, an advantage that is long gone. Now that everyone knows he’s returned, if I were V-" He coughed slightly. “If I were You-Know-Who, I’d simply wait.”

“Wait for what?”

Percy folded his hands. “I’d wait until I’d overrun the Ministry and then simply take it at my leisure.”

Ginny frowned at him. “I’m not sure I like how easy it is for you to slip into evil genius mode…”

Harry ignored her, and said, “That’s a fair point. You’re probably right.” He paused. “So if we take it, they’ll simply make another?”

“Yes, they have to under the law.”

“Hmm,” he said thoughtfully, the storm-warning expression gone from his face – and replaced by something equally worrying.

“Harry,” Ginny began. “I’m not sure now is the time for another one of your brilliant plans…”

He refused to so much as look at her, though, turning to Neville again instead. “How were you planning to get it, though? No one else can touch it, you know that.”

“I can touch it,” Neville said abruptly. “My Gran told me I can.”

“Really?” Harry didn’t look upset; he looked intrigued, almost hopeful.

“I got home last month and the first thing Gran does is sit me down and tell me I’m some chosen one… Or, at the very least, I’m the ‘second choice’ chosen one. So I figured we should find out what it says. I figured that if there's any chance it's about me that I have right to know.”

At this last, Harry looked distinctly uncomfortable.

“You know what it says,” Ginny said, realization dawning. “You know what it says and you didn’t tell us.”

"I know what it says," Harry admitted, shoving his hands into his pockets, "but I still think it's better that we have our own copy, with D-" He shook his head. “We just should.”

Neville narrowed his eyes at Harry. "You know what it says? Is it really about me? Is that what all that nonsense was about at my birthday?"

"Kind of," Harry said, not meeting anyone's gaze. "It's complicated."

"Maybe you’d like to share with the group?"

Harry sighed. “I think that if you really want to hear it, you should hear it directly – not from me.”

“Fine, then,” Neville said. “That was the plan anyway.”

“What is the actual plan?” Harry asked. “Last time we just walked right in the front door…”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Percy gave him a look that was classic, old school Percy: surprise, disdain and just a hint of superciliousness. Ginny pinched him. “Ouch!”

“He’s right though, Harry,” Neville said. “The Death Eaters cleared the place out for us last time, didn’t they?”

“Oh,” Harry said. “Yeah, I hadn’t thought of that.” A pause. “So how were you going to get in then?”

“There’s a series of tunnels leading in and out, dating back to the early, oh, sixteenth or seventeenth centuries. They were originally used for smuggling…” Percy broke off, looking as though he realized he’d lost the attention of everyone in the room except Luna. “Anyway, the tunnels are still there and they can be accessed from both outside and inside the Ministry in case of emergency.”

“So, basically, you’re planning to sneak in from above.”

Percy nodded.

“Hence the, uh-" Harry gestured vaguely at their cat burglar get-ups.

“Right.” Percy took off his glasses and cleaned them. “There are protective charms and wards on the entrances to the tunnels, of course, but…”

“But what?”

Percy shrugged. “I know a guy. I’ve got the most recent countercharms, and we’ll simply have to break through the wards. The charms are the more difficult part, so we shouldn’t face too much of a challenge.”

“Oh, is that all?” Harry murmured, but Ginny could tell he was a t least a little impressed by Percy’s plan.

“Isn’t that a little risky?” Ginny said.

“We’re breaking into one of the most secure buildings in the wizarding world,” Percy replied. “Of course it’s risky. However, your friends here are willing to pay an almost obscene amount of money for the pleasure, so…”

Harry, though, was apparently done listening. “When do we go?”

“What’s this ‘we’…?” Percy said.

“Don’t be an idiot. Of course I’m coming with you.”

“Me too!” Ginny said. She was damned if she would let them leave her behind. “Harry, tell them…”

Harry was quiet for a moment, giving her that odd, searching look again, the one he’d had since their trip down Knockturn Alley. “Ginny, too,” he said, after the moment had passed.

“No…” Percy said, folding his arms across his chest.

“Ginny and I are both coming with you – or else.”

Ginny made a face. “He pulled this on me earlier. I think he means it, though.”

“Or else what?”

“Or else I call the Order of the Phoenix and tell them what you lot are up to.”

“He’ll do it,” Ginny said. “He’s a total tattletale; he’s had lessons from the master.”

Percy gave her a very sour look. “I want to go on record as being completely opposed to this.”

“Come on, Percy. What could go wrong?” She grinned at him. “Got an extra pair of leather pants?”

*

Percy swore off babysitting when he was sixteen. This may or may not have had something to do with the fact that his last official babysitting charge had been brainwashed and ultimately abducted by the disembodied spirit of the most evil wizard ever – and that all this happened quite literally under his nose, without him noticing so much as a hair out of place.

Yet, somehow, here he was, four years later, once again babysitting Ginny – Ginny and three of her friends, including Harry Potter, the Boy Who Mucked Everything Up and Got Percy Sacked in the First Place.

This did not put him in an especially patient or forgiving frame of mind; neither did their impending attempt at breaking and entering his former place of employment. Added to that was the fact that, if Harry was to be believed, the last time they'd done this they'd walked straight into a Death Eater trap and managed to get several people very seriously cursed and at least one person very seriously dead.

Percy wasn't at all sure he actually believed Harry, but it worried him nonetheless.

What worried him most immediately, though, was the yawning darkness of the deep underground shaft at his feet. Wind that seemed to come from nowhere howled through the wide opening. It was, without a doubt, their best way down into the heart of the Ministry – but, now, faced with the reality of the thing, Percy was having second thoughts.

“Are you absolutely sure this isn't some weird attempt at suicide?” Ginny asked from beside him, apparently having some second thoughts herself. “You have been awfully depressed lately...”

“If it was, I can guarantee I wouldn't be taking any of you lot with me,” he replied tartly. “With my luck, I'd get stuck with you for all eternity.”

Ginny laughed. “Okay, that's fair. I don't think any of us want to be stuck with The Boy Who Moped until the end of days.”

He lowered his voice. “I do wish you'd go home, Ginny. This is going to be dangerous.”

“First, I've actually successfully broken into the Ministry before, which makes me more qualified to do this than you. Second, you're fine letting Luna, Neville and Harry get themselves killed, but not me?”

“Yes.”

Her expression softened a little bit. “That's nice, Percy, but totally stupid.”

“I love you, too, Ginny.”

She stuck her tongue out at him, but it was fairly half-hearted.

“We're just about ready, if you two feel like joining us any time soon,” Harry said, and apparently Percy wasn't the only one feeling cranky about this whole escapade.

“Keep your pants on,” Ginny said, walking over to join him. He grabbed the fastenings at her belt rather roughly, yanking her toward him so could attach her harness to the climbing ropes. “Easy, tiger,” she said, catching hold of his shoulders for balance, then more softly, “Harry, we don't have to do this...”

“Yes we do,” he said shortly, and let go of her. He fastened himself to the lines as well, and looked up, frowning at Percy. “I just don't know about this part. If Hermione were here she'd know some obscure spell so clever we wouldn't need ropes.”

“Well, they are _magic_ ropes,” Percy said, hooking himself up as well. “Besides, any magic that sophisticated runs a much greater risk of calling attention to our presence. This is the better way to do it.”

“That is,” Harry said, looking the closest to thoughtful Percy had ever seen him, “an awfully long way down.”

For her part, Luna looked worryingly pleased about the prospect. “It reminds me of the Wailing Pit of Despond.”

“Which doesn't exist,” Ginny said softly.

Luna continued as though she hadn't heard. “Listen to those Keening Crows! I've always wanted to see one! It sounds as though there's a whole flock of them down there.”

“Whats?” Harry said, looking a bit concerned.

“They don't exist, either.” Ginny paused. “But you still don't want to know... just in case.”

Luna took a long step back, got a running start and dived gracefully into the opening. As she descended, Percy could have sworn he heard her shout, “Wheee!”

Neville, looking bit pale, shrugged and jumped in after her.

“If you'd told me a year ago...” Harry said, locking gazes with Ginny, who smiled tightly at him.

“I know, I know. Unlikely heroes.”

He reached a hand out to her and, though she hesitated noticeably for a moment, she took it and let him help her up onto the ledge.

“Into another underground den of evil then, is it?”

“I haven't let anything happen to you yet, have I?” He tightened his grip on her hand.

She shook her head. “All right, let's go push our luck,” she said, and they jumped, leaving Percy all alone at the top of the shaft.

Percy counted to three, closed his eyes and stepped forward into nothingness.

Their descent was rapid, but controlled – they really were excellent magic ropes, if Percy did say so himself. They reached the bottom of the shaft quickly, and Percy led them down into an old but fairly sizable tunnel that appeared to lead to a dead end.

“Um?” Ginny began, clearly not sure Percy knew what he was doing.

“Through here,” Percy said, using his wand to peel away the covering from a large and very ancient vent. Several of the bars were missing, the spaces just large enough for a man to pass through. On the other side were the main lifts that operated in the heart of the Ministry.

“Are you sure this is best way to go? When we were here before-” Neville began.

“Please do as I say,” Percy said testily. “This is why you hired me, after all.”

He stepped through the grate and peered out into the elevator shaft. The lifts were all resting on the main floor several stories about them.

“It's the ninth floor, if I remember right, so that puts us about one floor up.” He quickly conjured a ladder that led from the hatchway down to the ninth floor, then stretched the ladder across the length of the shaft, like a bridge that led straight to the lift doors. Percy strode across and had the doors open in short order. Behind him, Harry shrugged and the others and came trotting across.

Once on the ninth floor, Percy led the way to the Hall of Prophecy, walking a path he'd walked hundreds of times over the past two years. It was slightly eerie to be here again, like looking at an old picture and not quite recognizing yourself. He wondered briefly what the old him would think of an adventure like this and realized that the person he'd been just a few months ago wouldn't even have been able to conceive of doing this.

Once inside the department, Percy stopped the spinning doors easily, moving mechanically and still half lost in his own thoughts, and turned to find Harry watching him, a questioning look on his face.

“How did you know how to do that?”

“I did work here for two years, you know – and I often had to check out different prophecies for transcription and the like. I was probably in this department at least once a week while I was on the Minister's staff.” He strode over to one of the doors. “I believe it's this one we want.”

“If we'd only known that six months ago,” Harry grumbled.

“Well, to be fair, I probably wouldn't have helped you six months ago.” Percy opened the door.

“Who says we would have asked? Polyjuice Potion works wonders, you know.”

“Ah, I see,” he replied, and held the door to let the others pass through ahead of him.

Harry sped up, grabbing Ginny by the arm. “No hummingbirds this time...”

“Only if you promise not to go chasing ghosts through any veils...” she replied tartly.

“That's a cheap shot, Gin,” Harry said, dropping his voice. Luna and Neville went on, apparently unable to hear them, but Percy, bringing up the rear, could hear every word.

“That doesn't stop it from also being true. That isn't why you wanted to come here, is it? I wondered.”

There was a long, dangerous silence, but finally Harry said, “No, it isn't.”

“Promise?”

“What do you want me to do? Swear it in blood?”

“Maybe, as long as the blood isn't mine...”

“Row 97, wasn't it?” Neville said from up ahead.

“Unless they've moved it...”

“Oh, no,” Percy heard Ginny say as he rounded the corner.

“What? What is it?”

“They did move it,” Harry said, looking unacceptably calm about this development.

“Moved it where?”

Neville swallowed hard, and pointed. “Up there.”

High above the rows of shelves now hung an old-fashioned bird cage with a single glass orb inside.

“Are we quite sure that's the one?”

“It's not on its usual shelf, and what other prophecy would they go to all that trouble for?”

This was a fair point, Percy had to agree. He tried to summon the thing, to no avail.

“Well, I think they've put some simple countercharms on it, but there doesn't seem to be much more protection than that. We won't be able to summon it, so it may need to be touched by human hands in order to be moved.”

Harry frowned. “We can float somebody up there to get it, assuming there aren't any other boobytraps...”

“There aren't,” Percy said. “Ministry Regulation #9487, sub-section B, clearly states what types of security mechanisms can be employed within the Department of Mysteries...”

“Unless they've changed that too.”

“They haven't,” Percy said firmly.

“And you know that because...?”

He wasn't about to admit that he still read all the regularly published Ministry regulatory reports avidly when they came out. Instead, he said, “I just do. That's why you're paying me, remember?”

Neville shrugged, and looked over at Harry. “So, up someone goes then?”

“I'll do it,” Luna said, looking quite pleased. “Or Ginny.”

“It has to be one of us. We're the smallest and the lightest,” Ginny said before anyone even had a chance to think about protesting. “It's the only way that makes sense and you know it.”

“But you're-” Neville began.

“Girls?” She raised an eyebrow. “Now is so not the time to have that conversation, but rest assured we will come back to it later.”

Percy sighed just perceptibly, and took out his wand. “Luna?”

Ginny made a face at him, but stepped back and let Luna go. Percy floated her slowly up until she was high above the shelves.

Nearly up to the birdcage, she looked down at them all. “This is really quite pleasant.”

Luna grabbed the prophecy, her pale hair floating weightlessly around her face. No protective spells triggered or alarms sounded. She looked like she was enjoying herself immensely, as she floated back to the floor. She reached out dreamily and handed the glass ball over to Harry, who shoved it into a pocket.

“Okay, let's get out of here.”

Their retreat was orderly and largely without incident, though Ginny did give Harry a supremely dirty look as they walked past one of the closed doors in the entrance to the department that Percy assumed had something to do with their earlier argument. Back in the tunnels, Percy moved to close up the vent into the elevator shaft.

“I'll need some help to close this up again,” he said. “No sense leaving a calling card, is there?”

“I'll help,” Harry said. “Neville, you too. Girls, head back up to the top.”

“I thought Percy was in charge...” Ginny began.

“Take it.” Harry shoved the prophecy at her. “Get going.”

“Fine, fine,” she said, taking it and Luna's hand and scrambling up to where they'd left the climbing lines.

The grate sealed, Percy, Neville and Harry followed – and Percy began to allow himself to relax a bit.

He really should have known better.

They were nearly out when an ominous sound, like far-off thunder, rumbled to life in the darkness of the shaft below them.

“What-” Ginny looked down, holding the faintly glow orb up like a torch.

Neville and Harry exchanged a look in the dim light, both clearly thinking about all Luna's talk of Keening Crows.

“Are those-?”

“No,” Ginny said. “They're just bats, which – ick – but they're nothing too terrible.”

“Just bats?” Percy said, straining to see for himself. “How many bats are we talking about?”

No one answered his question, though, because, quite suddenly, they were enveloped in a black cloud of screeching monsters with yellow eyes and leathery wings.

“Oh my,” Luna said, which did not seem at all to convey the seriousness of the situation in Percy's opinion.

“Keep moving!” Harry said from somewhere above. “We're almost there.”

But then, with a sickening snap, one of the lines broke. They all hung, suspended, for a fraction of a second, frozen in time. Then Ginny fell, the glass ball tumbling from her grasp. Percy reached out and caught her by the hand to stop her fall, the impact of her weight straining his own climbing line. Luna tried to catch the prophecy and missed. With his free hand, Percy pulled out his wand. He couldn't summon it back to him thanks to the countercharm, but he could at least cast a spell quickly to slow its descent, so it wouldn't break.

“Percy, can you mend this?” Neville had grabbed the severed end of Ginny's broken rope and slid down beside them, kicking a particularly large bat aside as he did. “None of us are really supposed to be doing any magic...” As though underage magic was the biggest of their worries at the moment.

“Yes, I think so,” he replied, beginning to sweat a bit from the effort of holding both Ginny and his wand. He managed it though. So much for his unbreakable ropes, though. He hadn't anticipated a direct attack by vampire bats, but still, they should have held.

Ginny dangled there for a moment, breathing rapidly. She refastened her mended line, looked down at where the softly glowing orb was disappearing into the darkness, then turned up to look at them all. “I'm closest. I'll get it.”

“No-” Harry began, but it was too late.

She took a deep breath and let go of Percy's hand.

“I said no!” Harry sounded furious. “Ginny, it isn't worth it.”

But she was already gone, back down into the dark.

For a long minute there was nothing but darkness and the wind from a thousand beating wings above them. Then, they heard her voice float up to them, “Well, get going! I'm right behind you.”

They emerged from the shaft in a rush of wind and wheeling bats – everyone except Ginny.

“Damn it,” Harry said, unfastening himself from the climbing lines and stalking back over to the shaft opening. “Damn it, Ginny.”

“I got it, didn't I?” Percy could hear her say as Harry reached into the opening, ignoring the last of the bats, grabbed her rope and began to pull.

Harry hauled her up and put her back on solid ground, looking mere seconds away from physically shaking some sense into her. Percy could relate.

“Home free,” Ginny said, a little shakily, clutching the glass ball in one white-knuckled hand, but she managed to smile at them all. “See, nothing to it.”

*

“I need a very stiff drink,” Percy said, opening the door to the office, heading straight for his desk and the emergency bottle of firewhiskey he had stashed in a bottom drawer.

“Hey, we did what we went there to do, at least,” Harry said, following him in.

“Whee!” Luna said from the outer office.

“That girl is not quite right…” Percy said, sitting down and pouring himself two fingers of whiskey. Harry raised an eyebrow meaningfully at him, and Percy reluctantly produced a second glass. “You’re a bit young, don’t you think?”

“I fought the evilest wizard of all time before I hit puberty. Pour me a drink.”

That was a fair point, so he did.

Harry finished his drink in two fairly heroic goes, though his eyes did water a bit. “So here’s the thing, Percy. I think you’re a wanker.”

Percy poured himself a second shot. “Most people do. Get in the queue.”

Harry looked surprised for a moment, then actually laughed. “Okay, not what I was expecting.” He laughed again. “I was going to say… I think you’re a wanker, but what you did tonight was pretty great. You’re good at this.”

Except, of course, for the part where he'd nearly got his sister killed – again. But all he said in reply was, “I didn’t expect to be. A singing demon told me I was supposed to save the world, and it all just sort of snowballed.”

Harry tilted his head to one side, looking at Percy like he’d never truly seen him before. “Someday you will have to tell me that story.”

“Guys? We’re ready to listen to it,” Neville said, from the doorway, holding the glass orb.

“Okay,” Harry said, standing. “Neville and I will-"

“That’s not how this works,” Percy heard himself say. “No secrets. I can’t help you if I don’t have all the information.”

Harry opened his mouth to protest, then reconsidered. “Okay,” he said. “All right.” He looked like the proverbial light bulb had gone on. “Why shouldn’t we all know? Bring the girls in here.”

When they were all gathered around, he set the glass ball on the desk and touched it once, lightly.

It was, like most prophecies in Percy's experience, wordy, opaque and grossly overblown. It also made it pretty clear that Harry's goose was likely pretty cooked.

“Holy crap,” Ginny said, and Percy thought that summed it up very well.

“So,” Neville said slowly, “you have to- and if you can’t, I guess I have to-"

“No, no,” Harry said. “That’s not exactly what it means.”

“According to who?”

“Well, Dumbledore said that because Voldemort thought it meant me that he chose me…”

“That does make sense,” Luna said, as though she was the world’s authority on things that made sense, “but it’s also only one way of looking at it.”

A very significant look passed between her and Neville.

“Why don’t we find out for ourselves,” Neville said, “rather than just believing everything we’re told?”

“Not just about this,” Luna said seriously. “About everything. We finally have an opportunity to do it now…”

“How so?” Percy asked.

“By working here, of course,” Luna said, still looking pink-cheeked and a bit elated from their caper.

“That is an utterly ridiculous idea…” Percy began.

“Really? I don’t see why we couldn’t.”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Ginny said. “In fact, I can’t believe I didn’t think of it myself.”

They all looked at Harry, who, in turn, looked at Percy. “They don’t tell us anything. Even after- Even after everything that’s happened, they treat us like children and keep us in the dark. Dumbledore promised not to do that anymore, but he’s- he’s gone now.” He paused heavily. “Luna’s right. If they won’t help us, we ought to try and do something ourselves.”

Then, as one, they all turned and looked to Percy.

“What do you say?” Ginny prompted gently. “Will you help us?”

He ought to, he knew, throw the lot of them out onto the street and then give Ginny a stern talking-to about responsibility and discretion and following directions and… somehow he couldn’t.

He put out his hand. “All right – but only until Hogwarts opens again, and you have to promise not to do anything foolish. I’m the boss here, not because I want to be or because I don’t think you can handle yourselves, but because my name is the one on that door. That makes me responsible for your safety. If you can’t agree to that, we don’t have a deal.”

Slowly, Harry nodded. He came forward and put his hand on top of Percy’s. So did Neville, followed by Luna. Grinning, Ginny slid off the desk and put her hand atop everyone’s.

“Go team,” she said.

*

Kingsley, for his part, proved less than impressed with Percy’s decision.

He showed up at the office a few days later with a stack of background checks for Percy to process and halted in the doorway, staring at the reception desk where Ginny sat lacquering her nails.

“Kingsley!” she said brightly, and then amended, “I mean, welcome to Weasley Consulting. How may I help you?”

Kingsley pointedly ignored her and pushed past Neville, Luna and Harry and into Percy’s office. “What are they doing here?”

“Interning,” Percy replied mildly. “For their Defense Against the Dark Arts credit.”

“Damn it all, Percy,” Kingsley hissed. “You know as well as I do that they haven’t any Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher this year.”

“All the more reason for them not to neglect their studies.” Percy took off his glasses and cleaned an imaginary spot from the lenses. “It’s all quite official, I assure you. I have signed permission forms from their families and Minerva McGonagall.”

“ _Forged_ , you mean.”

“The signatures seemed quite legitimate to me…”

Kingsley tossed his stack of papers on the desk and flung himself into the chair across from Percy in defeat.

“You can’t keep them locked up forever, Kingsley. It will only lead to one of them doing something rash.”

At that, a shadow crossed Kingsley’s face. “Perhaps, but-“

“At least this way I can keep an eye on them. I know I might not have been Dumbledore’s choice to do that – or my parents’ – but they came to me and I'm going to help them.”

“Be careful, kid. Dumbledore himself had- has a hard enough time keeping tabs on Harry.”

Percy glanced over Kingsley’s shoulder to the reception area where Ginny and Harry were bent over a dusty old book. Harry leaned in to turn the page before Ginny had finished. She slapped him smartly on the hand and gave him a frankly murderous look. Harry backed off immediately.

“You know, I think I’ll be all right in that regard.” He leaned back in his chair, folding his hands in front of him. “I have a secret weapon.”

Kingsley followed Percy’s gaze. “Yeah, maybe you do.” He paused. “Don’t be afraid to let me know if you need help, though.”

“Afraid?”

Kingsley sighed. “You know what I mean. You don’t exactly have the best track record of asking for help when you need it.”

Kingsley left the stack of background checks when he went, and Percy began dividing them up into equal piles.

“So,” he addressed his young charges, “I have your first assignment.”

They all crowded around him eagerly.

“What is it?” Neville asked. “A Death Eater plot?”

“Vampires?” said Harry.

“An infestation of Midlothian Barking Beasties?” Luna suggested.

“Hardly. Background checks on Ministry employees.” There was a very extended silence. Ginny blinked. Percy shook his head. “What were you expecting exactly?”

“Adventure! Excitement! Really wild things…”

“That’s on Tuesdays,” he replied dryly, and went to grab his coat. Having left the office in what he hoped were marginally capable hands, Percy went out to tea.

“You’re late,” Celia said when he walked in, but with a smile. “I ordered your usual.”

“Thanks,” he replied, sliding into the seat across from her.

“So,” she said, leaning her chin on her hands and looking at him with such fondness that his heart sped up a little, “saved the world yet today?”

“That was yesterday.” He smiled at her. “As of today, though, I officially have sidekicks.”

“Do you?” She laughed. “I’d make a Batman joke, but I doubt you’d know what I was talking about.”

The waiter brought Percy a pot of tea, and refilled Celia’s coffee cup. Rain was drumming, not unpleasantly, on the windows and for the first time in a very long time Percy felt almost content.

“What are you doing around eight?” he asked, suddenly feeling bold. “I thought I might take you out tonight.”

She blinked. “You mean like a date?”

He shoved his hands into his pockets and somehow found that he couldn’t quite meet her eye. “Well, sure.”

“Just so we’re clear here: this is an actual date. Like between a boy and a girl.”

“Yes, already!” Percy said, his face flushing.

Celia nodded, looking perfectly serious. “Just checking. I’ll see you at eight.”

*

At five minutes till eight, Percy was stalling. He lingered in the corridor outside Celia’s flat, unable to make himself knock on the door; his palms may or may not have been sweating. He raised his fist to the door, but hesitated at the last moment.

 _Be a man, Percy._ He could hear the echo of Ginny’s voice in his head.

“Fine then,” he muttered to himself, and knocked.

“Hi,” Celia said, opening the door. She was wearing a dangerous black dress and dangling earrings that looked like they were made from quicksilver. It took a moment before Percy could find his voice.

“I hope you’re speechless in the good way…” she said, leaning against the half-open door and raising an eyebrow at him.

“I-" He cleared his throat. “The good way, definitely. You look lovely.”

“Well, that’s a relief.” She shrugged into her coat. “It took me all evening to pick something.”

“I don’t believe that for a minute,” he said, offering her his arm.

He took her to a cozy basement bar in an old red-brick building. Luke had assured him that this was the hottest place going, and ideal for impressing a first date. It was not the sort of place that Percy would normally have picked himself, for a variety of reasons – not least of which was the fact that pretty much everyone they’d known at school was likely to be there. A few months ago there wouldn’t have been enough gold in the world to get Percy to go. Now, though…

They did get a few questioning looks on their way in. Percy knew he’d been pretty conspicuous by his absence from, well, the world these past months. With Celia on his arm, though, he found that he didn’t mind the attention quite so much.

“Nice choice, Weasley,” she said, grinning up at him as he took her coat and pulled her chair out for her. “Surprising, but nice.”

Moved by some territorial impulse, Percy put an arm across the back of her chair when he sat down. She looked up, surprised but also a little pleased.

“Buy me a drink? You did promise me a proper date, after all.”

He signaled the waiter to bring them a bottle of wine, then said, “How am I doing so far?”

“Not too shabby…”

“Percy!” Oliver Wood bounded out of the crowd and up to their table. “It’s been ages.”

Percy had always liked Oliver, though he couldn’t imagine anyone more different from himself. It was hard not to like Oliver; it was hard not to appreciate his enthusiasm for, well, everything.

“Hi, Oliver. How’ve you been?”

“Good, good!” He slapped Percy, a bit too roughly, on the back. “I heard about the Ministry, by the way. I’m sure that’s not what you want to talk about on a night out at the pub, but… Well, I just thought you should know that I think you got a bum deal. Lots of people do.”

“Thanks,” Percy said, and found for the first time in months that he really didn’t mind talking about it.

“Say there- Celia? I don’t know if you’ll remember me…”

“Of course I do,” she said, smiling at him. “I caught a bit of the match on the wireless yesterday, as a matter of fact. Nice play at the end there...”

If Oliver had grinned any wider, his face might have split. “Glad to hear it!” He grabbed Percy by the hand and shook it so enthusiastically that Percy’s glasses slipped down his nose. “Anyway, I’ll let you two get back to it. I just wanted to come over and say hello. You’ve been missed, Perce, really.” He also gave Percy a huge thumbs-up as he turned to go, mouthing, She’s corking, mate.

As though Oliver’s visit had defused some sort of tension, they were suddenly flooded with a stream of visitors – mostly Percy’s school friends, but some of Celia’s as well. When they were alone again, he looked over at Celia, color in her cheeks and a smile on her face, and realized it was the happiest he’d seen her since June. She turned to him, and he realized he must have looked quite the same.

She reached over and put her hand over his. “This is nice, Percy. Thank you. I’m not sure I would have had the nerve to come here on my own…”

“Me either, to be honest.”

A wild burst of laughter came suddenly from the far corner of the bar, causing Percy to jump and spill his drink. Someone stepped to one side and Percy had an unobstructed view of the table. Of course. He ought to have known – seated in the center of the action, as always, were Fred and George. He tried to look away before they noticed him, but it was too late. George elbowed Fred in the ribs and pointed in Percy’s direction.

Percy cursed softly under his breath, causing Celia to look over his shoulder at them. She frowned. “Do you know them?”

Percy just cursed again.

“Do you?” Celia said. “They certainly seem rather interested in you.”

“Yes, well… Those are my brothers.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“Two of them at least, though I suppose the others might be around here somewhere.”

“Rather conspicuous, aren’t they?”

“It’s their forte,” Percy said dryly, trying to keep from looking in their direction again.

“Hey…” She leaned forward, hooked an arm around his neck, and kissed him softly on the mouth.

When she pulled away, Percy, pink to the tips of his ears, said, “Whatever did you do that for?”

She shrugged. “I don’t think I want anyone or anything else getting more of your attention tonight than I do. Sound fair?”

He smiled in spite of himself. “More than fair,” he said, but he waved their waiter over and paid their bill as soon as he could.

“Let’s go.” He stood. “We were having a perfectly lovely time, and I don’t want it to get ruined.”

“Sure,” she said. “I understand.” She glanced sidelong at him. “I’m wildly curious, but I understand.”

“None of that now,” he chided, but it really didn’t bother him as much as it might once have. He helped her into her coat, and they walked out the door and up the steps.

“Where to, Weasley?” Celia asked.

Percy took her hand and began walking briskly away from the building. “Somewhere a little less crowded?”

“Hey! Percy!” someone called from the steps. Percy looked back. It was one of the twins, closely followed by the other. Percy was too far away to immediately tell which was which. They sped up, swaying slightly up the steps, trying to catch up.

“Yeah,” said the second twin. “We’ve got a thing or two to say to you.”

He pointed an accusatory finger at Percy, and then the building exploded behind them.

*

The next few seconds passed in a disjointed blur of noise, light and broken glass. Percy was thrown hard onto the wet pavement, landing face-down. An alarm began to scream somewhere off to his left. Percy rolled over, blinking plaster dust from his eyes. His glasses had gone, but miraculously he found them lying on the ground, scratched but unbroken. Celia, though, was lying a few feet away, very pale and very still. He scrambled over to her on his hands and knees.

“Celia?” He leaned over her. “Celia!”

There was an ugly knot on her head and a gash on her cheek, but she had a strong pulse and, outwardly at least, appeared mostly unharmed. Percy fumbled for his wand. She gasped and sat up.

“Are you all right?”

“I think so.” She struggled to get up. Percy took her by the arm and helped her to her feet. She was cradling her right arm, and put her good hand to her head as though she felt dizzy. “Percy, what happened?”

“I don’t know.” He looked around, scanning the rubble for any sign of Fred or George. The top two floors of the building appeared to have blown outward, the roof collapsing inward. The rest of the structure, including the basement, was still mostly intact – for the moment. Bricks and shattered glass littered the street; the street lamp had burst from the force of the blast making it nearly impossible to see where the twins might have been.

“We need light,” Celia said, rescuing her tiny evening bag from the pavement and digging rather unsuccessfully for her wand.

“Here,” Percy said, taking it from her gently and locating her wand. “Will you even be able to do anything with your left hand?”

“I’ll have to, won’t I?” She took the wand from him, holding it rather awkwardly. “Let’s find your brothers. Come on.”

“Wait-" He fixed his glasses quickly, then stripped off his jacket and sliced it into long pieces, using one to fashion a makeshift sling for Celia’s right arm and stuffing the others into his pockets for potential use as bandages.

“That’s smart, Percy,” she said. “Good thinking, and thank you.” She removed her own coat as well, wincing as she moved her right arm, and did the same, despite the fact that her dress did absolutely nothing to keep out the cold.

They picked their way through shattered bricks and mortar, Celia’s high heels crunching the slivers of glass on the pavement. The building listed ominously above them, making an eerie moaning noise as supports buckled under the sudden weight of the collapsed roof. They approached the entrance to the basement where Percy had last seen the twins, but all he could see was more debris. Bits of burning parchment floated down from the upper floors, turning to ash and falling like snow around them. There on the sidewalk, finally, was George. He was propped up against the wrought iron railing, ash collecting in his hair, looking for all the world as though he was just taking a bit of a kip.

“George!” Percy hurried over, Celia’s hand still on his arm.

“Percy, if he’s-" she began, but it wasn’t necessary. George was bruised and bloodied, but still very much alive.

“Come on, we have to move him.”

“Percy, no! We don’t know the extent of his injuries. We can’t just move him; we might do more harm than good.”

Percy blinked at her. “We can move him without moving him. We have magic.”

“Oh, of course we do.” She looked down at her wand. “I think I might be a bit hysterical, just so you know.”

“Well,” he said, moving George a safe distance from the building, “you’re managing it rather well, if that’s any consolation.”

“Not really, but I’ll take what I can get.” She knelt beside George. “I’ll take care of him. Go find your other brother.”

Celia woke George, who grinned up at her, obviously still a bit disoriented. “Say,” he said. “If this is heaven, I’m not complaining…”

“Hold still,” she said briskly, ignoring him. “I need to make sure you aren’t permanently damaged. You know, I think you’re lucky that you’re rather drunk, otherwise you’d have been hurt much worse…”

Percy, meanwhile, found Fred, dazed and breathing rapidly, at the head of the basement steps. The exterior wall of what had once been the ground floor tilted perilously over the open stairway.

“Move,” Percy said, but Fred didn’t reply. His eyes were still half closed. “We’ve got to move!” Percy repeated, grabbing him by the armpits and hauling him into the street just as the wall collapsed, effectively blocking the only entrance to the basement.

Fred stumbled to his feet, took one look at Percy and socked him in the eye.

“Ow,” Percy said, nonplussed, clutching at his eye.

“You utter bastard.”

“I just saved your life!”

George jumped to his feet as well, Celia on his heels. He had a piece of Celia’s coat wrapped tightly around his left bicep, but didn’t appear to be actively bleeding.

“Percy!” George said, balled his fists and made as though to come to Fred’s aid.

“What is the matter with all of you?” Celia said, looking shocked. “There are still people in there!”

“You’re right,” Percy said, taking a step back and reaching a hand out to her. “Help is likely on the way, but it might be too late. The building could collapse any moment. We have to see what we can do.” He paused significantly. “And then we can settle anything that still needs settling.”

“I’ll see what I can do about keeping those walls up as long as possible,” Celia said, taking off toward the corner of the block.

“George, go with her.”

“Where do you get off…?”

“ _Go_.” Even to his own ears, his tone left no room for argument. “Fred, help me with the stairs, if you’re up to it.”

Fred seemed to take that as a challenge and plunged down what was left of the stairs, wielding his wand with a vengeance. After a few minutes, George joined him with equal enthusiasm. Between the three of them, they managed to dig a very large hole in the rubble, quickly if not especially carefully.

Celia appeared at the top of the steps, looking rather peaked from the effort of casting the strongest protection spells possible around the remaining floors of the building.

“It will hold, but not forever,” she said, inspecting their progress. “How long do you think-?”

“I don’t know. It really depends what shape the basement itself is in, and if anyone’s even still…” He left the words unsaid, but Celia nodded in understanding. He looked pointedly at Fred and George. “And assuming those two don’t bring the whole thing down on us with their carelessness.”

“Have a little more faith in my spellwork than that, won’t you?” she said. “Besides, I don’t mind so long as the Wonder Twins there are hitting rock and bricks and not you.”

Percy wiped dirt and sweat from his forehead and managed to smile at her. “I appreciate your concern.”

She reached out to hold onto his shoulder, jumped down into the stairwell with him and began to help.

“Hey, hey!” Fred called from the bottom. “I found the door.”

All four of them moved to clear the doorway of debris. Once it was clear, they pulled the door from its hinges, but only found more dirt and brick behind it.

“Keep digging,” George said, climbing over a wooden beam and into the gap where the door had been.

From behind the remaining large pieces of rock, Percy could hear voices.

“I can hear them!” He abandoned his wand altogether and heaved the last chunks of cement to the side with his bare hands. The hole was just big enough for a man to crawl through.

“Percy!” Oliver Wood’s face appeared in the opening. “Oh man, are we glad to see you.”

A cheer went up from the darkness behind Oliver. George and Celia embraced in celebration, George letting out a whoop. Fred shoved Percy roughly to the side, though.

“Look out, Percy. We’ve got to reinforce this thing before we start hauling people out.”

“Well, get to it then.” Once Fred had finished, Percy turned back to the opening. “All right, Oliver. Let’s get you all out of there.”

Oliver nodded and started helping the others through the opening. He hoisted a petite girl with a gash across her forehead up into Percy’s arms. Celia immediately took her up the stairs to relative safety and pressed a makeshift bandage to her head.

There had to be at least a hundred people trapped in the pub, most of them with minor injuries of some sort. When they ran out of strips of Percy’s and Celia’s coats to use for bandages, Fred and George shed their sweaters and began tearing pieces from their undershirts.

Percy helped a rather wobbly girl up the stairs to relative safety. As he handed her off to one of the twins, he saw a group of people on brooms dive toward the pavement and begin to dismount. He recognized the figure in front immediately.

“Kingsley!”

“Oh, kid.” Kingsley hit the ground running, tossing his broom smoothly aside. “I’m glad to see you’re okay.”

“It took you long enough to get here…”

“Yeah,” Kingsley said grimly. “We ran into some trouble on the way.”

The Aurors did look somewhat worse for wear, but they streamed into the street efficiently setting up perimeters and supplies, and generally taking charge.

Tonks appeared at Kingsley’s elbow. “Any dead?”

Kingsley looked to Percy for confirmation.

“Not that we know of. Not yet, at least.”

Percy led them over to the stairway, where the stream of survivors coming through the opening had stemmed – and not a moment too soon. Despite Celia’s best efforts to keep the walls reinforced, the downward pull of gravity was becoming too much for even magic to hold back.

Fred and George both sprinted to the opening, trying to convince Oliver to come through. “Come on, Oliver. You’re the last one in there-"

“Hang on, I need to be sure,” he said, even as the nearest fall of bricks began to shudder ominously, the spells finally starting to give way. “We can’t leave anyone behind.”

“There’s no more time,” Percy called into the darkness. “Oliver…”

“Okay, okay…”

They pulled him free just as the spell failed and a rain of bricks crashed into the opening where he’d been just seconds earlier. Percy coughed violently, masonry dust filling his mouth and nostrils.

“Well,” Oliver said, with a slightly manic grin, “that was close.”

They emerged from the wreckage with Oliver, limping, supported between Percy and George. The street was total bedlam, and yet beyond some magical barrier Muggle traffic sped past, completely oblivious to the chaos.

“The building’s going. You’d better get everyone clear,” Percy called in Kingsley’s general direction, picking up as much speed as he could with half Oliver’s not-inconsiderable weight on his shoulder.

“I guess I’m out for the match versus Holyhead, eh?” Oliver said, still grinning.

“You know they’re going to say you’re just scared to play a bunch of girls, right?” George said, smiling in relief as well, and aimed Oliver in the direction of the team of St. Mungo’s healers who’d now descended on the scene as well.

Percy let them go and looked around for Celia. She was leaning against the ruined lamppost, scanning the crowd, he assumed, looking for him as well. It had started to drizzle and she was shivering violently in her thin dress.

“Celia?”

“I think I may be sick,” she said, looking very green, sweating despite the cold, and nearly pitched into Percy’s arms. He picked her up and carried her over to where the healers had set up a sort of makeshift triage area.

“She got a nasty knock on the head, but seemed fine until now,” he said, setting her down on one of the cots.

“Hello, dear,” a plump middle-aged witch said, shining the lit tip of her wand in Celia’s right eye and then her left. “Do you know what day it is? And who’s the Minister of Magic?”

“October 5th, and Rufus Scrimgeour – the wanker.”

The witch laughed. “Well, no permanent damage done then. I think you may have a mild concussion, though…”

Percy breathed a sigh of relief, until the healers immediately began fussing over him as well. He tried to wave them off.

“That’s a hell of a shiner, kid,” Kingsley said, having come over to check on Celia. “You ought to let them fix it.”

Percy relented, on the condition that they give him the cot next to Celia’s.

“This isn’t quite how I imagined the end to our evening,” he said, leaning back and realizing for the first time how bone-tired he was.

Celia, looking much improved, reached across the space between them to briefly lace her fingers with his. “The night’s still young, Weasley. Things could start looking up.”

*

In truth, though, Celia was having a very, very bad night.

Despite the fact that the very nice healer had fixed both her sprained wrist and her concussion, she kept coming over all dizzy – something they’d said might happen – as they'd loaded her into a horseless carriage with Percy and Kingsley Shacklebolt, who seemed to be acting as their personal Auror escort. The movement of the carriage kept making her vision swim and her head ache vaguely. She also kept having to fight down the very inappropriate urge to fling herself at Percy and never let go.

She settled for reaching over and grabbing hold of his hand instead.

He looked down, as though surprised, but then looked up again and smiled at her, squeezing her fingers slightly as the carriage lurched to a stop.

Percy turned and looked out the window, then cursed softly. "What are you thinking, Kingsley? Bringing us here?"

"I thought someone should tell your parents that the twins are all right, and on their way home."

"And you couldn't just have sent a note?"

“No, I couldn’t.” A look passed between the two that Celia couldn’t quite interpret. “Come on, out with you. I’ll be back soon with the others.”

“This is a very bad idea, Kingsley…” Percy said, but climbed out anyway, helping Celia after him.

The carriage took off at a fast clip, leaving them standing in the muddy yard.

“What is it, Percy? What’s wrong?”

"This is The Burrow," he said, sighing. "This is where I grew up."

The house was in slight disrepair, though it looked welcoming enough.

"This is where your family lives?"

"Not at the moment, but they must be here tonight," he said, and refused to elaborate on the subject.

Instead of going to the front door, he headed around back to the kitchen entrance, Celia in his wake, trying to keep up despite the mud and her rather impractical shoes.

“They’ll be in the kitchen,” he said, half to himself, coming to a halt in front a weather-beaten door that didn’t hang quite right on its hinges. He took a deep breath, putting Celia slightly behind him as though he half-expected to have to shield her from curses, and knocked.

Nothing happened.

He knocked again, clearly beginning to lose his nerve. “Maybe Kingsley was mistaken-" he said, and shifted his weight as though to turn and walk away.

The door opened abruptly, held by a boy who looked like a carbon copy of Percy, only a few years younger. The boy’s eyes widened and he uttered an exclamation completely inappropriate for mixed company. He let the door fall open wider, revealing what had to be nearly Percy’s entire family seated around a massive kitchen table, all of them staring, open-mouthed, at the doorway.

“Well,” Percy announced, “I’m home.”

For a very long moment, no one spoke. A petite, red-haired woman, who had to be his mother, stared at them, clearly caught somewhere between relief and disbelief. Finally, Ginny popped up from behind her mother.

“Percy! Kingsley said-" She paused, her cheeks going quite pink. “I mean, I thought Fred and George were…” She stuttered to a halt, clearly not sure what information could be freely shared in front of whom.

“Fred and George are just fine. They’re on their way home,” Percy said, very pointedly not looking at anyone but his sister. “Kingsley sent us on ahead to make sure you all knew.”

“Oh, Kingsley,” Ginny said softly. “Nice try, but…”

On her other side, her father looked up at that, an unreadable expression on his face, but didn’t say anything.

“I suppose,” his mother said, standing up herself, twisting a dish towel nervously in her hands, “I suppose you’d better come in.”

Celia looked up at Percy, expecting him to be smiling or, at the very least, looking relieved. He was all right, his brothers were safe, he’d saved a hundred people nearly singlehandedly tonight – and most importantly his family hadn’t tossed them out into the street, at least not yet.

Percy was scowling.

He looked down at her, though, and the crease in the center of his forehead smoothed. "Are you quite sure you're all right?" he said, helping her to a chair at the kitchen table. He reached down and touched her earlobe, gently, and she realized that one of her earrings was gone.

"I told you, I'm fine."

In the light of the kitchen, though, neither of them really looked fine. Percy was filthy, covered in masonry dust and scrapes, his shirt torn and bloodied. Celia caught a glimpse of her own reflection in one of the shiny copper cooking pots. She looked pale as a ghost, shaken, with smudges of dirt and blood on her face.

“What the hell happened tonight?” one of the nearly-identical brothers asked from the head of the table.

Percy shrugged. “I don’t know if anyone is quite sure yet. I suppose it could have been an accident…”

“Not likely.”

“No,” Percy sighed, “it’s not very likely.”

“Hey,” a soft voice said in Celia’s ear. Ginny had come to sit beside her. “Here’s some coffee.”

Celia smiled. “Now that’s just what the doctor ordered. Thank you.”

Meanwhile, the others were still discussing the explosion and what was being done to clean up in its aftermath. “Can you take us back there? We ought to be helping.”

“I-" Percy hesitated, then appeared to come to a decision. “Of course. I imagine they’d be glad of the extra help. The Aurors did seem a bit short-handed.”

Percy, his brothers and father all stood and headed toward the door.

“Not you,” Mrs. Weasley said, catching the youngest boy by the ear.

Percy turned back and leaned down to Celia. “Will you be all right here with… with Ginny?”

“I should come with you. I’m no use to anyone just sitting here.”

“You’ve already done quite enough for one night, and you’re under strict orders to rest. You’re very lucky you weren’t more seriously hurt.”

“Percy…”

“No arguments,” he said firmly. “You know I’m right.”

“Okay, all right.” She put a hand on the back of his neck, holding him there for a moment. “Percy, be careful.”

She watched him leave with the others, suddenly aware that his mother was watching her in turn.

The door closed, the kitchen suddenly very quiet, and she found herself alone with Mrs. Weasley, Ginny, Percy’s youngest brother and a girl who had the distinction of being the only non-redhead (and, Celia assumed, non-Weasley) in the bunch – apart from herself, of course.

“Sooo…” Ginny said into the very awkward silence, drumming her fingers on the tabletop.

“Oh, my! Is that all the coffee?” Mrs. Weasley said, even though there was still enough to keep a small army wired for days – though, to be fair, perhaps not an army of Weasleys, if Ginny was anything to go by. She jumped up and busied herself making another pot.

The boy took advantage of the distraction and edged toward the kitchen door.

Ron…! The girl mouthed at him, and Ginny rolled her eyes.

“I can see you, Ronald,” Mrs. Weasley said, without even turning around. “Try that again and you _will_ regret it. You’re not so big that I can’t still take you over my knee.”

It was patently untrue – the boy was even taller than Percy – but he paled a bit at the threat anyway and sat obediently.

Ginny snickered and refilled Celia’s coffee. She wrapped her hands around the cup, trying to warm them. Her head did still hurt, vaguely, but she’d have given anything to be up and moving, doing something useful instead of sitting here trying to figure out what topics of conversation were safe to broach with the estranged family of a man who might or might not be someone very important to her. What did people talk about in these situations anyway? Gossip? Current events? Definitely not. The weather? Yes, that was probably safe.

Clearly, Mrs. Weasley had come to the same conclusion. “It’s already quite cold for this time of year, isn’t it?” She clucked her tongue disapprovingly. “And you without a proper coat.”

“Well, I did have one to start but half the people I knew at Hogwarts are currently wearing it as bandages.”

“Oh! Oh dear. I’ll fetch you something.” She paused, considering, then said, “Ginny, if your brother tries to escape again, scream.”

“Gladly,” Ginny said with a wicked grin in Ron’s direction. He stuck his tongue out at her. “Oh, very mature.”

Mrs. Weasley returned after a few moments with an obviously homemade sweater and a pair of rather worn house slippers. “Put these on. You must be freezing.” She gave Celia’s shoes a slightly disapproving glance. “Lord only knows how you can walk in those things.”

“Thank you,” Celia said, gratefully putting the sweater on and ignoring the commentary on her shoes.

“You’ll have to forgive us, of course, for not doing proper introductions,” Mrs. Weasley continued, seeming to relax a bit now that she had tasks to occupy her, taking a bottle of Ogden’s down from the highest shelf in the pantry, “things being what they are tonight. Though it seems that you already know Ginny…”

“Celia’s a friend of Kingsley’s,” Ginny lied smoothly, and even Celia, who’d once been paid to lie for a living, was impressed.

Ron and the little brunette, who must have been his girlfriend, gave Ginny a look that said they knew otherwise.

Mrs. Weasley came over and tipped a healthy measure of the whiskey into Celia’s coffee cup. “There you are. That should help put some color back in your cheeks.” She sat across from Celia, folding her hands expectantly. “And how do you know Percy?”

Celia took a very generous drink of her ‘improved’ coffee and considered her words carefully. “Percy and I worked together at the Ministry.”

“Oh!” the brunette said suddenly. "I remember you. You said all those horrible things about Dumbledore."

Celia blinked. "Horrible things?"

"That he was wrong about You-Know-Who, that he was just making things up to make the Minister look bad…"

"Hermione-" Ron grabbed warningly at her wrist, but she shook him off.

“Don’t be idiots,” Ginny said, folding her arms. “Rude much?”

“It’s all right,” Celia said, not really sure if it was all right. “I did say those things, it’s true. I believed them at the time. I trusted the Ministry, and so did Percy."

There was a long silence, but then Ron suddenly said, "He shouldn't have. He should have trusted his family! Maybe Percy didn’t always fit in with the rest of us, maybe some of the things he said were even true… That doesn’t make what he did right.”

“Did you ever think,” she said, not unkindly, “that maybe he thinks the same about all of you?”

He blinked, as though that thought hadn’t ever occurred to him before. The awkward moment was saved by the sudden arrival of a post owl.

“Get that, won’t you, Ron?” Mrs. Weasley suggested, in the same way a general might ‘suggest’ a battalion capture enemy artillery.

“You care quite a lot for him,” Mrs. Weasley said so only Celia could hear, while Ron, Ginny and Hermione were preoccupied with the owl and its letter.

“He’s a good person,” Celia replied, unable to stop herself – though maybe that was the whiskey. “He may not always be right, but he always follows his convictions.” She paused. “He loves you, all of you. Your good opinion meant everything to him, and once he lost it-”

“Is that what he says? He blames us?”

“He doesn’t talk about it, but I can see how much it…”

Ron came back over to the table, holding his letter, looking very grumpy. “It’s from Harry. He and Lupin are there helping, of course.”

“Hmm,” Mrs. Weasley frowned. “Remus and I will have to have a talk about that.”

Another owl followed in quick succession after the first. Mrs. Weasley opened the letter and scanned it quickly, her face relaxing. “Arthur says they won’t be too much longer. There’s not as much damage as they’d feared at first.” She upended the envelope and tipped something into her hand. “Here,” she said, reaching across the table to Celia. “They found this. Percy said it was yours.”

It was her missing earring.

She shook her head. “Oh, Percy. Of all the things…” She put it back on, his mother still watching her.

Without a word, Mrs. Weasley poured another shot of the whiskey into each of their coffee cups. They sat that way, in silence, in the kitchen for another hour at least, Celia watching out the window and Mrs. Weasley watching the hands of a rather unusual clock.

The front door banged open, breaking the silence, and both women jumped.

“They’re back!” Ginny called from the sitting room.

Mrs. Weasley rushed through the door. Celia stood to follow her, when the back door opened as well and Percy came in from the yard. He looked thunderous, muttering darkly to himself. Apparently, the rescue mission with his father and brothers hadn’t gone particularly well. His face changed when he saw her, though.

“Hi.” She crossed the room to get to him, but stopped short of embracing him. “What do you say? Are you about ready to take me home? I think it might be past my curfew.”

“Percy?” They jumped slightly apart. Neither of them had noticed his mother come back into the kitchen. “Can I get you anything? A cup of coffee? Some brandy? I think I still have…” She faltered. “I have some of your things upstairs if you wanted to change into something warmer.”

“Take it,” Celia said softly. “I know you have to be freezing.”

“I guess I could-" Percy began, but the moment was interrupted when the door to the kitchen opened and Kingsley and Mr. Weasley entered.

The three men were very pointedly not looking at one another.

“Did you find- Was anyone killed?” Celia said to Kingsley, attempting to break the tension.

Mrs. Weasley brought him a cup of coffee. “Thanks, Molly.” He paused to take a drink, as she poured a cup for her husband as well. “We found a couple dead on the top floors, but all those kids in the pub were saved thanks to some quick thinking.” He looked at Percy and Celia. “That was good work, you two.”

Celia went to the stove and got Percy a cup of coffee, but he barely touched it.

“We had help.” Percy shrugged. “We couldn’t have done it alone.”

“Still,” Kingsley said, and Percy finally looked at him. Both of them relaxed a bit, which just seemed to make Mr. Weasley that much more tense.

“Well, thanks. I’m glad we were there. I’m glad we were all there, anything else aside…”

The door swung open again admitting the twins, Ron, Hermione, Ginny and another brother that Celia hadn’t been properly introduced to yet.

“What is _he_ still doing here?” one of the twins demanded, pointing at Percy.

“The way I hear it,” Kingsley said mildly, leaning against the stove, “he saved your lives tonight…”

“And was rewarded with a black eye for my trouble,” Percy said, handing his practically untouched coffee to his mother without looking at her.

“You promised we’d settle that later,” the twin said, moving to roll up his sleeves. “Well, it’s later.”

Percy took Celia by the elbow. “That’s our cue to leave, I think.”

“Percy, don’t leave yet…” his mother began.

“Why not?” He turned back to his brothers. “After all, we’ve established that I’d risk my life to save any of yours, but you wouldn’t piss on me if I was on fire…”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“Well, there you have it.” Percy turned sharply on his heel and walked out. The door slammed behind him, and all eyes turned to Celia. She swallowed hard.

“I guess we’ll be going then, is that it?”

Feeling very exposed, she gathered her things and crossed the kitchen. Neither Ginny nor Mrs. Weasley would quite meet her eye.

“Hey-" Kingsley began as she passed him.

“Leave it for another time, won’t you?”

She pushed open the door Percy had just exited through. He stood at the window in the large, somewhat shabby sitting room, staring out at the muddy yard. She had a hard time, she had to admit, imagining him growing up in this place. It was so unlike the Percy she knew. She walked up behind him and slid a hand along the line of his shoulder blade. His muscles tensed and he half-turned to see who was touching him.

"Are you all right?" she asked.

He shrugged noncommittally. "We should go. I don't want to wear out our welcome, after all," he said bitterly.

"Percy, this is ridiculous. They're your family!"

"Not anymore, clearly, and there isn't much to be done about that."

“Percy, they do still love you. It’s perfectly obvious to anyone who cares to look. They’d hardly be so angry with you if they didn’t care…”

"You don't understand."

"Then make me," she said, very aware that Percy's mother, at least, was probably listening at the door. "Make me understand just what's happened that's so terrible it can't ever be mended."

He sighed. She'd never seen him look so tired, or so young. "I made a choice, the wrong choice. When you make the wrong choice, you just have to live with it."

"That is completely absurd. I've never heard anything so stupid! Parents don't just abandon their children when they make mistakes. All children make mistakes. That's what they do!"

Unexpectedly, Percy began to laugh. "You looked like Ginny just then. I thought you might end by stamping your little feet or throwing a lamp across the room."

"Stop it," she said. "Don't change the subject. I won’t let you get away with that."

“You did see what happened in there just now, right?”

“I did, and it was awful.”

“The one time-" He laughed bitterly and shook his head. “I’d always done exactly what was expected of me, you know. Anything my parents ever wanted – or that I even suspected they wanted – I did. None of that matters now, the only thing that does matter to them is the one time I didn’t.” He took his glasses off, closed his eyes briefly, and then replaced them. “And that doesn’t even begin to address the problem of my brothers. I don’t suppose you know how unbearable a house full of brothers can be?”

"I'm an only child," she said.

"Lucky you."

There was a muffled crash from the kitchen and Percy started abruptly.

"Let's go. I mean it this time," he said, grabbing her by the arm and heading for the door.

*

“Well, that could have gone better,” Kingsley said, once they’d all heard the front door slam behind Percy and Celia.

Molly, in the midst of cleaning up the shards of a coffee cup she’d shattered in the sink, abruptly started to cry, fumbling in her apron for a handkerchief, and Kingsley felt like the world’s biggest ass.

“Molly-"

“It’s just… He’s gone on with his life without us, hasn’t he? I suppose I knew he would but…”

“Mum,” Ginny said gently. “It’s a good thing. He’s happier. Celia is very nice, and I think she’s good for him.”

“A bit out of his league,” George grumbled.

“That’s enough of that!” Ginny replied sharply. “You really couldn’t have been civil to him for, like, thirty whole minutes?”

“Ginny,” Bill said, not looking happy at all, “you were just as angry with him last summer as the rest of us.”

“That’s right!” Fred jumped in. “All of a sudden you’re defending him and acting like we’re the bad guys in all this...”

An unspoken question hung on the air, and Ginny looked to Kingsley for the answer – a brief, subtle motion, but it was enough to let the cat completely out of the bag.

“Well,” Arthur said, calmly, but in a tone that left no room for argument, “I think that’s enough discussion for now. Perhaps we should all get cleaned up and head to bed?” He paused. “Kingsley, would you stay for a minute?”

The kitchen door closed behind Molly and the kids. Arthur still sat at the table, hands folded, pointedly not looking at Kingsley. For his part, Kingsley had the unsettling feeling of being fifteen again and caught in some foolish lie.

“I know what you’re going to say,” he began, before Arthur had a chance. “I guess maybe I shouldn’t have…”

“Tried to manipulate us all?” Arthur offered.

“When you say it like that, it just sounds bad.” He dropped into the chair across from Arthur. “He saved the twins’ lives tonight. That’s not an exaggeration, it’s the truth. He literally rescued them from a burning building. If there ever seemed like an opportunity for a reconciliation…”

“Clearly, you don’t know my son as well I do.”

“Maybe, or maybe I just have the advantage of getting to see a different side of him.”

“You say that like I want things this way. I’d give anything to turn back the clock and make sure this never happened.” He ran his hands over his face, looking exhausted.

"Nothing is ever so broken that it can't be fixed," Kingsley said. "Not with families, not if even one of you is still willing to try. You taught me that, remember?"

“This isn’t quite the same as your situation…”

“You’re right. What my dad did was worse.” He helped himself to more coffee. “But I’m still glad I made at least a little peace with him before it was too late – and I never would have done that if you hadn’t been there to give me a kick in the pants.”

“So this is you returning the favor?”

“Something like that. Look, I know how disappointed you are in him, how much he hurt you. But will that really matter that much if the worst does happen?”

“Now you sound like Molly.”

“Molly’s a smart lady…”

Arthur shook his head. “She’s a little too ready to forgive him; to just pretend this never happened. I can’t do that.”

“That’s fair. But I’ve gotten to know the kid pretty well these last few months. He’s still so young, Arthur… He wanted to be his own man, to do something he could be proud of all on his own. Everybody goes through that at some point; he just has really rotten timing.”

“You’re more forgiving than I am.”

“I just think your expectations of him are still higher than they would be for any of your other kids, except maybe Bill.”

Arthur considered that for a moment, then actually cracked a small smile. “When did you get so wise, anyway?”

“Hey, I had a good teacher.” They sat in silence for a while. “This is fixable. He might not be ready to admit it yet, but I do think he wants to make things right. I think you do, too.”

After a long moment, Arthur sighed heavily. "It won't ever be the same again, though."

"No," Kingsley said. "That you're probably right about."

*

Out in the yard, Celia took Percy’s hand gently in hers, turned and, with a soft pop, they were suddenly standing at the door of her flat. He was grateful to her for taking charge; he wasn’t sure he could have managed it himself.

“Come on in,” she said, digging a very old brass skeleton key from her bag and unlocking the door. “I’ll fix you a drink.”

“No, that won’t be necessary,” he said, following her inside. “I’ll be all right. It’s hardly the first time something like this has happened – it’s just the first time it’s happened in a while. I guess I’d tricked myself into believing that things were getting better.”

“Aren’t they, though? At least in some ways?”

He looked at her. She was still wearing his mother’s sweater and slippers, her muddy, ruined shoes dangling from one hand, her face lined with concern for him.

“Come here,” he said, sliding the sweater from her shoulders and guiding her to the sofa. He wrapped her in a soft blanket. “What can I do for you? I could run you a bath, maybe?”

“Is that a hint?” she said, with a tired smile. “You’re hardly pristine yourself, Weasley.”

“No! I just- You’re making fun of me.”

“Maybe a little.” She slid closer to him, the blanket falling around her shoulders. “There is something you can do for me, you know.”

“Anything.”

“Since this was a real, proper date – albeit a more thrilling one than I’m accustomed to – maybe you could still give me a proper kiss good night?”

He looked down at her, at her pale face, at her ruined dress. “Usually when a date goes this badly, there is no good night kiss.”

“Indulge me,” she said, so he did.

He leaned in and gently brushed his lips over hers. Her arms went around his neck, and he kissed her again, very softly.

“Stay,” she breathed into his ear, her arms still around him. “Stay here tonight.”

“What?” He pulled away slightly. “Oh, I don’t think there’s any need for that...”

“Perhaps I haven't made myself clear enough.” She took his face in her hands, looking him in the eye. “I want you to stay here. With me. Tonight. In that way.”

“Well, yes,” he said, before he could stop himself, “but you also sustained a head injury earlier.”

“My judgment may be rotten, Percy, but it isn't because of that.” She smiled at him. There was, in fact, still the faintest shadow of a bruise near the corner of her left eye. “My judgment where you're concerned has been impaired since about five seconds after they tossed us out of the Ministry.”

“And you're sure that wasn't just the vodka?”

“Percy…” She moved even closer; she was practically sitting in his lap. “Stop joking around, stop making excuses. If you don't feel this way about me, fine. Say so.”

There was an extended pause.

“Celia-” he began, and didn't get any further than that. She leaned in and kissed him so hard he saw stars. He lost a few minutes after that, and when he came back to himself they'd slid down onto the sofa. Celia had a leg hooked around his thigh, her foot resting against the curve of his calf.

“Why after they sacked us?”

“What?” she said, opening her eyes slowly and looking up at him.

“You said you started to think of me 'that way' after they tossed us out of the Ministry. We worked together for a year before that. We sat right next to each other every day for a year...”

She shook her head slightly, as though she couldn't believe they were having this conversation while his hand was still halfway up her skirt. “Would you ever have approached me that way while we still worked together?”

“Well, no.”

“And why not?”

“Because if it hadn't worked out...”

“We sat right next to each other. How awkward would that have been? I didn't let myself even consider the possibility of you, and I never would have if we hadn't gotten sacked.” She sat up, pushing him away slightly. “I got involved with someone, right out of school. He came from a very influential family with lots of political connections. We ran in all the same circles, personally and professionally. It was a colossal mistake and it ended very badly. I learned my lesson; I’ll never do something like that again.” She paused. "Look, I’ll admit up front that I have trouble with relationships, but I think you of all people probably understand that."

"I do," he said. "But that doesn't mean you ought to trust me. I'm- I'm not very good at this sort of thing either. I'll probably just wind up hurting you."

"And I might hurt you. People hurt each other, Percy. I'm tired of trying to avoid that. The fact is, I do trust you, and no matter what happens here tonight, I'm not going to stop." She reached up and took off his glasses. “Now, are you going to kiss me again or not?”

So he did.

At least for a few minutes.

“Just one last thing...” he said, pulling away.

“No. There aren't any guarantees, and I'm not going to make any promises I might not be able to keep. Anything you need to ask me can wait.” She stood up, grabbing his hands and tugging him up off the sofa. “Let's do this properly.”

She kissed him again, biting down on his lower lip, and in that moment he would have followed her anywhere. They lurched back against the bedroom door, and she fumbled with the handle.

He'd never seen the inside of her bedroom. All the times he'd been at her place, the door stayed closed. He had to admit that he'd wondered what it looked like. He'd never let himself get much farther than that, at least not while he was awake. The bedroom was softer, darker, a little messier, than he'd imagined. Celia had a high bed, with a thick down comforter and fat pillows, not at all what he'd expected. He pushed her back onto the blue bedspread and she caught his arms and pulled him with her.

Her head hit one of the pillows. "In spite of all the danger," she murmured.

"What?"

"That's what I sang, for the career counselor back in June: 'In spite of all the danger, in spite of all that may be, I'll do anything for you, anything you want me to, if you'll be true to me.' It's The Beatles. Even you have to have heard of The Beatles." She reached up and touched his face. "Don't you remember? You wanted to know."

"I did," he said softly, "and you thought I'd laugh."

"And?"

"I'm not laughing, am I? I told you I wouldn't."

“That you did,” she murmured, sitting up and unzipping her black dress. She left the earrings on, though.

They were a little awkward with each other, and for Percy at least it had been a fairly long time since he'd done this. At one point she reached out and clasped his hand in hers, a gesture he'd previously always thought of as overwrought and cliché. This time, though, looking down at her face, it didn't seem cheesy at all.

When they were finished, he kissed her once before turning over and nearly getting lost in the layers of soft bedclothes. He settled for resting his head on a stack of fluffy pillows.

“Now,” she said, rolling over and laying her head against his back. “Now you can ask whatever it was you wanted to ask before.”

“It hardly seems appropriate now,” he said, his voice muffled slightly by the pillows.

“It seemed fairly urgent about twenty minutes ago.”

“All right then,” he sighed. “Did you decide you wanted to do this tonight because we were nearly killed? Or because-?” _Because you were taking pity on me_ , he thought but didn’t say.

She actually laughed. “Percy, I've been trying to get you into bed for nearly four months. It didn't take an explosion and a minor concussion to convince me to seize the moment.”

*

Kingsley went straight from the Burrow to the Ministry, expecting to find a large pot of coffee and a pile of paperwork. What he found instead was Tonks, sitting on his desk and worrying her lower lip between her teeth.

“Everyone okay?” she asked as he approached.

“Physically, sure.” He dropped into the chair behind the desk. “What's up?”

“We found out who owned that building, and what the upper floors were used for…”

“And?”

She cracked a small smile. “It's a pile of trouble, as usual.” She unrolled a piece of parchment and spread it flat so he could read what was written there.

Kingsley raised an eyebrow. “You don't say.”

“I suppose it could be a coincidence…”

“I don’t believe in coincidence,” Kingsley said grimly. “Not these days, at any rate.”

She sighed. “Yeah, me either. I sent Dawkins and Gerard to bring him in. They should be back any time now, depending on how much of a fight he puts up.”

“You're expecting a fight?”

“Not a physical one, of course. I am expecting him to have a pack of solicitors to bring down on our heads though.”

“Well, you're not wrong about that,” Dawkins said, striding up to them. “He came with us, quiet as a lamb, but by the time we got here there was a pack of ambulance chasers camped out outside the interview room.”

“Can we question him?”

“You can try – I doubt they'll let him say much.”

Kingsley headed toward the interview room, with Dawkins and Tonks in tow.

“Do you have any idea why you’re here?” Kingsley said as he entered the room.

“I can only imagine,” John Edison replied, the expression on his face carefully neutral.

“We've counseled our client not to talk to you,” one of the solicitors said. She was young and attractive with a vaguely American accent.

“And I've chosen to ignore them,” Edison said.

“He's chosen to ignore us,” she continued, “because he claims he has nothing to fear.”

“Nothing to fear, eh?” An interesting choice of words, Kingsely thought. Nothing to fear, not nothing to hide. “You’ve had a run of bad luck recently, haven’t you, Mr. Edison?” he said. “A high-profile investigation into your firm’s finances, and now this not-at-all suspicious explosion at one of your buildings… It says here that your company stored a lot of records on those top two floors. None of that information is going to see the light of day now.”

“Purely a coincidence.” He waved a hand, apparently unconcerned.

Kinglsey pressed on, “A couple security guards got caught in the explosion, you know. Men with families…”

“That is terrible,” Edison said without even a blink.

“It could have been much worse. There were about a hundred people trapped in the pub in the basement of that building.”

“Yes, but those people escaped harm, didn't they? Through, so I'm told, the actions of some very resourceful young people.”

How the hell Edison knew about that was a question Kingsley wasn't even going to try to figure out yet. But it made it very clear that the guy was in this up to his eyeballs, and, more than that, he wanted them to know it.

“Yeah, it was pretty lucky they were there.”

“I don't believe in luck,” he replied. “Nothing happens without a purpose.”

This was getting them nowhere, so Kingsley decided to try a different tack.

“Whoever did this caused a lot of hurt tonight. Most people think it was another attempt to terrify the public, to pave the way for Voldemort's return to power.” He paused significantly. “We have a name for the people who do things like that, Mr. Edison...”

“Leave,” Edison said abruptly. “All of you, everyone except Mr. Shacklebolt.”

The American lawyer frowned. “John...”

“Leave.”

“Hit a nerve, did I?” Kingsley asked once the others had left.

“You’ve got this all wrong,” Edison said. “We aren’t Death Eaters, Mr. Shacklebolt. We’re simply concerned citizens – citizens who want our world back, who want order not chaos.”

“And what are you willing to do to achieve order? Are you willing to sacrifice lives? Are you willing to break laws?”

“Which laws? I think you'll find that the laws of our world aren't universally respected.”

“You sound like you're looking to get yourself in a pack of trouble...”

“And if you had any evidence clearly linking me to that explosion, you'd already have brought charges against me.” He leaned back, looking up at Kingsley. “You won't find anything. I’ve told you before; I’m not the man you want.”

“Who is then?”

“That’s the funny thing about it.” Edison smiled and it was thoroughly unpleasant. “The man you’re looking for isn’t a really man at all.”


End file.
